elephant hunting in Kenya
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Elephant hunting, which used to be an accepted activity in Kenya, was banned in 1973, as was the
ivory trade The ivory trade is the commercial, often illegal trade in the ivory tusks of the hippopotamus, walrus, narwhal, mammoth, and most commonly, African and Asian elephants. Ivory has been traded for hundreds of years by people in Africa and Asia, ...
. Illegal hunting continues, as there is still international demand for
elephant tusks Elephants are the largest existing land animals. Three living species are currently recognised: the African bush elephant, the African forest elephant, and the Asian elephant. They are the only surviving members of the family Elephantidae and ...
.
Kenya ) , national_anthem = "Ee Mungu Nguvu Yetu"() , image_map = , map_caption = , image_map2 = , capital = Nairobi , coordinates = , largest_city = Nairobi , ...
pioneered the
destruction of ivory The destruction of ivory is a technique used by governments and conservation groups to deter the poaching of elephants for their tusks and to suppress the illegal ivory trade. , more than of ivory have been destroyed, typically by burning or ...
as a way to combat this
black market A black market, underground economy, or shadow economy is a clandestine market or series of transactions that has some aspect of illegality or is characterized by noncompliance with an institutional set of rules. If the rule defines the se ...
.
Elephant Elephants are the largest existing land animals. Three living species are currently recognised: the African bush elephant, the African forest elephant, and the Asian elephant. They are the only surviving members of the family Elephantidae an ...
poaching Poaching has been defined as the illegal hunting or capturing of wild animals, usually associated with land use rights. Poaching was once performed by impoverished peasants for subsistence purposes and to supplement meager diets. It was set a ...
continues to pose a threat to the population.


Colonial Kenya

During colonial times, elephant hunting in Kenya was seen as a sport for noblemen and was exploited by the colonial governors.
British East Africa East Africa Protectorate (also known as British East Africa) was an area in the African Great Lakes occupying roughly the same terrain as present-day Kenya from the Indian Ocean inland to the border with Uganda in the west. Controlled by Britai ...
was not unique in this:
big-game hunting Big-game hunting is the hunting of large game animals for meat, commercially valuable by-products (such as horns/antlers, furs, tusks, bones, body fat/oil, or special organs and contents), trophy/taxidermy, or simply just for recreation ("s ...
was popular in many parts of the Empire. Among the
white hunter White hunter is a literary term used for professional big game hunting, big game hunters of European or North American backgrounds who plied their trade in Africa, especially during the first half of the 20th century. The activity continues in t ...
s, the bull elephant was said to be the most exhilarating target. Small-bore
rifle A rifle is a long-barreled firearm designed for accurate shooting, with a barrel that has a helical pattern of grooves ( rifling) cut into the bore wall. In keeping with their focus on accuracy, rifles are typically designed to be held with ...
s appeared to be the preferred option and aiming at the brain instead of the heart was another preference. The motive was not always monetary. However, many hunters were indiscriminate in their choice of elephants to kill – young, old, male or female, it did not matter, as the primary purpose was ivory to sell and
elephant meat Elephant meat is the flesh and other edible parts of elephants. History Elephant meat has likely been a source of food for humans during the entire time of the species' coexistence. By the beginning of the Middle Palaeolithic, around 120,000 BCE, ...
to feed their hunting party. The
East African Professional Hunter's Association The East African Professional Hunter's Association (EAPHA) was an organization of East African white hunters founded in Nairobi, Kenya in 1934. Well known members included Philip Percival, Harry Selby, Sydney Downey and Donald Ker. Their motto ...
was formed to regulate the industry and restrict its excesses. The Association, which came into being at the Norfolk Hotel, Nairobi, stemmed from a desire to regulate hunting in the wake of technological developments like the safari vehicle, which had made accessing remote hunting areas much easier. During its existence it was able to accomplish much to conserve East African wildlife and become perhaps one of the most respected societies in the world of its kind. One of the most prolific of the white hunters was the Scottish adventurer W. D. M. Bell, who is reported to have killed over a thousand elephants, spread across several African countries. See the first of his memoirs, ''The Wanderings of an Elephant Hunter'' (1923), for more information. Some of the madness of the desire to shoot an elephant (albeit not in Kenya) is shown in ''
White Hunter Black Heart ''White Hunter Black Heart'' is a 1990 American adventure drama film produced, directed by, and starring Clint Eastwood and based on the 1953 book of the same name by Peter Viertel. Viertel also co-wrote the script with James Bridges and Burt Kenn ...
'', a fictionalised version of what happened during the filming of the Hollywood classic ''
African Queen ''African Queen'' is a studio album by South African singer Makhadzi, released on September 3, 2021 by Open Mic. It features Mkomasan, Prince Benza, Mr Brown, DJ Dance Okashi, Vee Mampeezy, Jon Delinger, Kabza De Small, Lady Du, Cassper Nyovest, ...
''. In 1963, the first year of independence, the
Kenyan government , image = , caption = Coat of arms of Kenya , date = 1963 , jurisdiction = Republic of Kenya , url = http://www.mygov.go.ke/ , legislature = Parliament of Kenya , meeting_place = ...
issued 393 permits (
hunting license A hunting license or hunting permit is a regulatory or legal mechanism to control hunting, both commercial and recreational. A license specifically made for recreational hunting is sometimes called a game license. Hunting may be regulated ...
s) for elephants. In the 1950s and 1960s, the Kenyan poacher received approximately Shs. 3-4/lb ($.79–1.05/kg); by the 1970s, it was Shs. 100/kg ($12.74/kg), increasing the black market value for the primary producer from about one-fifth to one-third of the real value.


The ban, and ivory smuggling

According to the American hunter
Craig Boddington Craig Boddington is a professional hunter, TV show host, author and United States Marine Corps, Marine. Biography Craig Boddington was born in Kansas in 1952. His early big-game experience included pronghorn and mule deer in Wyoming, White-taile ...
, elephant hunting was made illegal in Kenya in 1973 and all animal hunting without a permit in 1977. By the late 1970s, the elephant population was estimated around 275,000, dropping to 20,000 in 1989. Between 1970 and 1977, Kenya lost more than half of its elephants. In the 1970s,
Ngina Kenyatta Ngina Kenyatta (née Muhoho; born 24 June 1933), popularly known as "Mama Ngina", is the former First Lady of Kenya. She is the widow of the Kenya's first president, Jomo Kenyatta (~1889–1978), and mother of the fourth president Uhuru Kenyatta ...
(Mama Ngina), wife of then-President
Jomo Kenyatta Jomo Kenyatta (22 August 1978) was a Kenyan anti-colonial activist and politician who governed Kenya as its Prime Minister from 1963 to 1964 and then as its first President from 1964 to his death in 1978. He was the country's first indigenous ...
, and other high-level government officials were allegedly involved in an ivory-smuggling ring that transported tusks out of the country in the state private aeroplane. ''New Scientist'' claimed that there was now documentary proof that at least one member of "Kenya's royal family" (the Kenyatta) had shipped over six tons of ivory to China. In the 1970s, 1900 elephants were killed in Kenya for their ivory tusks, increasing to 8300 elephants in the 1980s.


The worldwide ban on ivory trade

In 1989, as a dramatic gesture to persuade the world to halt the ivory trade, President
Daniel arap Moi Daniel Toroitich arap Moi ( ; 2 September 1924 – 4 February 2020) was a Kenyan politician who served as the second president of Kenya from 1978 to 2002. He was the country's longest-serving president. Moi previously served as the third vice ...
ignited twelve tons of elephant tusks. In the 1990s the widespread ban on commercial ivory trading reduced the industry to a fraction of what it had been and elephant populations have stabilised. But illegal poaching and sale on the black market still poses a serious threat, as does government bribery. The largest poaching incident in Kenya since the ivory trade ban occurred in March 2002, when a family of ten elephants was killed. Illegal elephant deaths decreased between 1990, when the
CITES CITES (shorter name for the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora, also known as the Washington Convention) is a multilateral treaty to protect endangered plants and animals from the threats of interna ...
ban was issued, and 1997, when only 34 were illegally killed. Ivory seizures rose dramatically since 2006 with many illegal exports going to Asia. Poaching spiked seven-fold between 2007 and 2010. Large scale tourism promotion picked up in Kenya following the imposed hunting ban in Kenya since 1977. It has been noted that "photographic tourism", or non-consumptive wildlife use, is contributing 12% of Kenya’s GDP. Hence, some groups have recommended that tourism be promoted rather than any kind of hunting or consumptive wildlife use, as it could divert the attention of the government of Kenya from the policy goal of wildlife preservation.


The current situation, including safari tourism

Though elephant hunting has been banned for a 40-year period in Kenya, poaching has not reduced. Given the poverty of many of the people, and the high value of elephant tusks, they are shipped overseas and sold on the black market. Although Kenya has many national parks and reserves protecting wildlife, elephant populations are still at risk, a problem which is made worse by corruption and some officials supplementing their income with permitting poaching. The Kenyan government has attempted to crack down on elephant poaching with the aid of multi-nationals but has often been too late in preventing the poaching of many elephants whose tusks have been seized ''en masse'' in cases at Nairobi Airport and in Bangkok Airport where Kenyan tusks have often been imported. Arrests continue at Nairobi's international airport, where 92 kilos of raw ivory were seized in 2010, and 96 kilos in 2011. An individual case that received publicity in 2014 was the death of Satao, one of the world's largest elephants, in the Tsavo Trust. Despite
Kenya Wildlife Service Kenya Wildlife Service is a state corporation under the Ministry of Tourism and Wildlife established by an act of Parliament; Wildlife Conservation and Management Act CAP 376, of 1989, now repealed and replaced by the Wildlife Conservation and Ma ...
guards, poachers managed to shoot the bull with a poisoned arrows and cut off his tusks.


Possible trophy hunting in the future

Trophy hunting Trophy hunting is a form of hunting for sport in which parts of the hunted wild animals are kept and displayed as trophies. The animal being targeted, known as the "game", is typically a mature male specimen from a popular species of collectable ...
, purely as sport and as a conservation action, is now being considered for adoption in Kenya, as such a programme appears to have yielded positive results in Namibia and South Africa under a programme titled "Community-Based Natural Resource Management" (CBNRM). Under this programme, while cash was offered as an incentive for sport hunting, the basic aim was wildlife control on the communal land, providing benefits to the community as a whole. It is believed that trophy hunting might attract elephant poachers into moving into legal hunting and leaving elephant trading. The
Food and Agriculture Organization The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO)french: link=no, Organisation des Nations unies pour l'alimentation et l'agriculture; it, Organizzazione delle Nazioni Unite per l'Alimentazione e l'Agricoltura is an intern ...
's (FAO) report states: "Trophy hunting is generally self-regulating because low off-take is required to ensure high trophy quality and marketability in future seasons. Trophy hunting creates crucial financial incentives for the development and/or retention of wildlife as a land use over large areas in Africa, including in areas where ecotourism is not viable. Hunting plays an important role in the rehabilitation of degraded wildlife areas by enabling the income generation from wildlife without affecting population growth of trophy species." The policy of trophy hunting has been adopted in 23 sub-Saharan African countries. The income generated in total in Africa is quoted to be USD 201 million/year, derived from about 18,500 international hunting clients covering an area of 1.4 million km². Since there is a lack of consensus among the clients about the efficacy of this method of biodiversity conservation in Africa, a study carried out by the Africa Wildlife Conservation Fund indicates that if Kenya makes trophy hunting legal again, nearly 90% of the clients would be interested to pursue this activity in that country. In this context, the importance of effective regulation of hunting operators and clients has also been highlighted. One of the disadvantages of trophy hunting is the possible publicity backlash, such as
Zimbabwe Zimbabwe (), officially the Republic of Zimbabwe, is a landlocked country located in Southeast Africa, between the Zambezi and Limpopo Rivers, bordered by South Africa to the south, Botswana to the south-west, Zambia to the north, and Mozam ...
experienced with the
killing of Cecil the lion Cecil ( 2002 – 2 July 2015) was a male African lion who lived primarily in the Hwange National Park in Matabeleland North, Zimbabwe. He was being studied and tracked by a research team of the University of Oxford as part of a long-term stud ...
.


See also

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Elephant hunting in Chad Elephant hunting or elephant poaching and exploitation of the ivory trade are illegal in Chad and pose a major threat to elephant populations. The profitable ivory industry is also a threat to the lives of rangers, even in the national parks, su ...
*
Environmental issues in Kenya Environmental issues in Kenya include deforestation, soil erosion, desertification, water shortage and degraded water quality, flooding, poaching, and domestic and industrial pollution. Water resources Water resources in Kenya are under pressu ...


References

{{Africa topic, Elephant hunting in Environmental issues in Kenya Economy of Kenya Elephant hunting Environmental conservation Hunting by country Ivory