Gabon has agreed to help battle poaching in protected areas in the Central African Republic following an elephant massacre at a renowned World Heritage site, reports the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS).

According to the conservation group, Michel Djotodia, acting president of the Central African Republic (CAR) transitional government, and Gabon President Ali Bongo Ondimba met on May 14 to discuss a variety of issues, including the worsening ivory poaching situation in CAR. Earlier this month at least 26 elephants were killed at Dzanga Bai, a site that lies in CAR’s portion of Dzanga-Ndoki National Park and is famed for its high density of endangered forest elephants. The slaughter occurred after rangers abandoned their post due to violence in the area.

Elephants massacred for ivory in Central African Republic (05/10/2013) Dozens of elephants have been slaughtered in the Dzanga Bai World Heritage Site in the Central African Republic just days after conservationists warned about an impending threat from the movement of 17 heavily armed poachers. The massacre occurred at a site renowned as ‘village of elephants’, where tourists and scientists have for decades observed wild elephants congregating at a large clearing to feed on minerals.

After the meeting, Gabon dispatched a group led by Mike Fay, a legendary conservationist who led an epic walk across the Congo rainforest in 1999-2000, to CAR to work with the government to secure Dzanga Bai and resume conservation activities. Conservation staff have now returned to the site, according to WCS.

“The good news from Dzanga-Sangha National Park after reports of extensive elephant poaching comes as a huge relief, along with the agreement that Gabon and the Central African Republic have agreed to work together to improve management of CAR’s protected areas,” said WCS President and CEO Cristián Samper. “We offer our appreciation to the leadership being shown by acting president of the Central African Republic transitional government, Michel Djotodia, and to President of Gabon, Ali Bongo Ondimba.”

Under the agreement between the two countries, Gabon will assist CAR in developing a national parks agency, training staff in conservation and management of protected areas, and establishing “a legal and institutional framework” for protected areas development and management. The initiative will also aim to improve coordination between cross-border conservation programs in neighboring Congo basin countries.



Forest elephant in Gabon. Photo by Rhett A. Butler

President Ali Bongo said he hoped the regional institutions as well as international NGO would join Gabon and CAR addressing the issues that have spurred a surge in ivory poaching.

“There is a clear link between blood ivory and civil instability in Africa, making this much more than just an environmental issue,” the president said in a statement. “We should all work together to restore sound governance in CAR, which will protect both its people and its spectacular wildlife.”

Lee White, Executive Secretary of Gabon’s National Parks Agency (ANPN), said that the developments over the past few days mark a rare bit of good news on the elephant poaching front in Central Africa.

“This agreement is a great example of a ‘south / south cooperation’” said Lee White, Executive Secretary of Gabon’s National Parks Agency (ANPN). “Africa has lost 70% of its forest elephants in 10 years and even in Gabon, where we have been less affected, 30% of our elephants have been killed during this period. We hope that we can help our colleagues in CAR to preserve Dzanga-Sangha, which is one of the most important protected areas in Africa and to restore the other protected areas that were once the countries pride and joy.”

Elephant poaching has surged in recent years due to growing demand for ivory in East Asia. More than 35,000 elephants were killed last year for their tusks, according to some estimates. Central Africa has been particularly hard hit, with the region’s forest elephant population declining more than 60 percent in the past decade.

Related articles

Elephants massacred for ivory in Central African Republic

(05/10/2013) Dozens of elephants have been slaughtered in the Dzanga Bai World Heritage Site in the Central African Republic just days after conservationists warned about an impending threat from the movement of 17 heavily armed poachers. The massacre occurred at a site renowned as ‘village of elephants’, where tourists and scientists have for decades observed wild elephants congregating at a large clearing to feed on minerals.

17 poachers allegedly enter elephant stronghold in Congo, conservationists fear massacre

(05/07/2013) Local researchers and wildlife guards say 17 armed elephant poachers have gained access to Dzanga Bai, a large waterhole and clearing where up to 200 forest elephants visit daily in the Central African Republic (CAR)’s Dzanga-Ndoki National Park. WWF, which works in the region but has recently evacuated due to rising violence, is calling on the CAR government to rapidly mobilize its military to stop another elephant bloodbath in central Africa. Elephants are being killed across their range for their ivory, which is mostly smuggled to East Asia.

Emergency: large number of elephants being poached in the Central African Republic (warning: graphic image)

(04/25/2013) WWF and the Wildlife Conversation Society (WCS) are issuing an immediate call for action as they report that poachers are killing sizable numbers of forest elephants near the Dzanga-Sangha protected areas in the Central African Republic (CAR). The two large conservation groups have evacuated their staff from the area after a government coup, but local rangers are still trying to determine the scale of the killing while defending remaining elephants. In total the conservation groups believe the parks are home to over 3,000 elephants.

An insidious threat to tropical forests: over-hunting endangers tree species in Asia and Africa

(04/04/2013) A fruit falls to the floor in a rainforest. It waits. And waits. Inside the fruit is a seed, and like most seeds in tropical forests, this one needs an animal—a good-sized animal—to move it to a new place where it can germinate and grow. But it may be waiting in vain. Hunting and poaching has decimated many mammal and bird populations across the tropics, and according to two new studies the loss of these important seed-disperser are imperiling the very nature of rainforests.

Infamous elephant poacher turns cannibal in the Congo

(04/03/2013) Early on a Sunday morning last summer, the villagers of Epulu awoke to the sounds of shots and screaming. In the eastern reaches of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, that can often mean another round of violence and ethnic murder is under way. In this case, however, something even more horrific was afoot.

Poachers enlisting impoverished wildlife rangers as accomplices in elephant, rhino killing

(04/01/2013) Corruption among wildlife rangers is becoming a serious impediment in the fight against poaching, fuelled by soaring levels of cash offered by criminal poacher syndicates, senior conservation chiefs have admitted. Rangers in countries as diverse as Tanzania and Cambodia are being bribed by increasingly organised poaching gangs keen to supply ivory, rhino horn and tiger parts to meet huge consumer demand in Asia.

A thousand soldiers sent after marauding elephant poachers [warning: graphic photos]

(03/26/2013) Eight Central African nations have announced they will send a thousand soldiers after poachers responsible for slaughtering 89 elephants, including over 30 pregnant mothers, in Chad earlier this month. The mobilization of soldiers and law enforcement officers could be a sign that Central African countries are beginning to take elephant poaching, which has decimated populations across Africa, more seriously.

Seeing the forest through the elephants: slaughtered elephants taking rainforest trees with them

(03/11/2013) Elephants are vanishing. The booming illegal ivory trade is decimating the world’s largest land animal, but no place has been harder hit than the Congo basin and its forest elephants (Loxodonta cyclotis). The numbers are staggering: a single park in Gabon, Minkebe National Park, has seen 11,100 forest elephants killed in the last eight years; Okapi Faunal Reserve in the Democratic Republic of the Congo has lost 75 percent of its elephants in fifteen years; and a new study in PLoS ONE estimates that in total 60 percent of the world’s forest elephants have been killed in the last decade alone. But what does that mean for the Congo forest?

What happened to the elephants of Bouba Ndjida? [warning: graphic photos]

(03/07/2013) A new report released by the Wildlife Conservation Society says that poachers have killed a staggering 62 percent of Africa’s forest elephants in the last decade. The insatiable demand for elephant ivory hails mainly from China and Thailand, which is ironically hosting this year’s CITES (CoP16) meeting. The meeting will continue until March 13 2013. The study is based on a survey of five elephant range states including Cameroon. Cameroon is the home of Bouba Ndjida National Park, where the dizzying massacre of 650 elephants occurred last year.

62% of all Africa’s forest elephants killed in 10 years (warning: graphic images)

(03/04/2013) More than 60 percent of Africa’s forest elephants have been killed in the past decade due to the ivory trade, reports a new study published in the online journal PLOS ONE. The study warns that the diminutive elephant species — genetically distinct from the better-known savanna elephant — is rapidly heading toward extinction.

Religion, Chinese government drive global elephant slaughter

(01/24/2013) By some estimates, more than 30,000 elephants were slaughtered across the savannas and forests of Africa and Asia for the ivory trade during 2012. The carnage represents as much as 4 percent of the world’s elephant population. Accordingly, some conservationists are warning that elephants face imminent extinction in some of their range countries. While the plight of elephants is increasingly visible due to media coverage, less widely understood is the role religion plays in driving the ivory trade. This issue was explored at length in an explosive cover story published in National Geographic by Bryan Christy last October. The story, titled Blood Ivory, detailed how demand for religious trinkets is driving large-scale killing of Earth’s largest land animal.