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Elephants in Zimbabwe
Photo: Philimon Bulawayo/ REUTERS
Zimbabwe has asked European countries for help in selling ivory.
His country currently holds about $600 million worth of ivory and rhino horn, Fulton Mangwanya, head of Zimbabwe's parks authority, told European ambassadors in the capital Harare on Monday.
This is a "burden" that is "very painful" for the country in southern Africa.
International trade in ivory, which makes up elephant tusks, has been banned by the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) since 1989.
But the smuggling goes on.
Poachers kill thousands of elephants in Africa every year.
The greatest demand for ivory is in Asia.
Mangwanya asked the Europeans for permission for the "one-off sale of our national ivory holdings."
The national park director said proceeds from the sale will be used to support communities near wildlife reserves.
Encounters with elephants are often life-threatening for humans: in Zimbabwe alone, elephants have killed 60 people so far this year.
According to official figures, the number of elephants in Zimbabwe has more than doubled in recent years and has risen to a good 100,000.
The Swiss Ambassador Niculin Jäger, however, reacted cautiously to the Zimbabwean request – on behalf of his European colleagues: The protection of wild animals and measures against illegal wildlife trade are “international problems” because of the involvement of criminal organizations.
It is therefore necessary to “strengthen international cooperation”.
Three years ago, Zimbabwe, together with neighboring Botswana and Namibia, failed at a CITES summit with a request for the sale of ivory that had accumulated through confiscations from poachers or the natural death of elephants.
wit/AFP