There are many problems when it comes to the near extinction of the African Elephant. No matter the efforts by elephant conservation organizations, it takes all of us to stop this downward spiral. The African Elephant population has declined by 100,000 in the past decade. This is a frightening amount that should alarm most people. The following are the main reasons for African Elephants nearing extinction.
The main problem when it comes to African Elephants is the most valuable piece of them, their tusks. The African Elephant’s ivory tusks are very valuable when it comes to poachers and the trade market. These poachers don’t see innocent animals, they see money bags. The ivory tusks are worth $1,500 per pound. Nearly 250 pounds of elephant tusks are poached every few days. This results in a hefty pay day for the poachers, getting close to $1,750 in a couple days. The problem is, why would they want to stop, nobody is stopping them. Although it is illegal to poach African Elephants, they’re still doing it. Approximately 30,000 African Elephants are killed per year. At that rate, the population will be zero by the year 2040. The question then may be, what are they using the ivory for? There are a few things that ivory is sold and used for: trinkets, traditional chinese medicine, jewelry, tools, furniture, piano keys, hanko (name seals), and tusks. In reality, all of these uses for ivory are wants not needs. The only one that could gain some traction is the Chinese medicinal usage, but it’s proven that the medicine doesn’t work. We need to keep the African Elephants alive and keep their tusks with them where they belong.
Another reason the rapid extinction of African Elephants is such an issue is their role in the environment. There are four main effects African Elephants have on the environment: sourcing water, providing food, dispersing seeds and building habitats. The one people don’t think about much is how much elephants help other animals by sourcing water. As said in Brielle Albert’s article on the importance of elephants to the environment, "of course, water is vital to all living things. When the weather conditions are dry for a long period, the lack of water causes problems for all species, particularly large animals like elephants. Using their ivory tusks, elephants dig ’wells’ in the ground in order to access water below the surface. This not only provides them with what they need but also allows other animals to get much-needed water too" (Albert 1). They allow an entire ecosystem to gain water when not readily available. If you take that out of the ecosystem, it could cause catastrophic change to all species. Loss of elephant habitat also causes more human-animal interaction. This then results in more elephants being killed by poachers. We need to conserve these creatures and their environment, unless we want a catastrophic collapse in the ecosystem they live in.