/kloc-in 0/800, there were 26 million elephants in Africa alone. However, after years of poaching and habitat destruction, the number of existing elephants has become insignificant compared with more than 200 years ago. At present, there are less than 50,000 elephants in Asia. The total number of African elephants is much more than that of Asian elephants, and they are also facing the threat of genocide. At present, the number of elephants in Africa is less than 400,000, but before westerners set foot on the African continent, there were 5 million to 6.5438+million elephants in Africa. Today, on average, more than 65,438+000 elephants are still hunted every day. If this continues, elephants in most parts of Africa will be extinct in the next 15 years. Perhaps our generation will be the witness of the disappearance of the most familiar animal elephant.
"African elephants are facing an unprecedented crisis. Every 65,438+05 minutes, an elephant is hunted for its ivory. " Ms. Greer, General Representative of IFAW Asia, said.
For thousands of years, ivory products have been highly sought after, which is also the main reason why elephants are hunted. Behind poaching is a large demand for ivory products in the international market, especially in the East Asian ivory trade market headed by China. Although the ivory trade was banned in 1989, it never stopped. In some areas, buying ivory stocks is the reason for the continuous ivory trade. Coupled with the decrease in the number of elephants and the increase in poaching costs, the value of ivory is also rising, which is more sought after by consumers. Poaching has caused one fifth of elephants to disappear. In 20 1 1 year, 20,000 African elephants were killed because of the ivory trade, which even exceeded the total number of African elephants born that year. Illegal ivory products are seized every day all over the world, and China, as the largest consumer market, has an average of two batches of illegal ivory products seized every day.
No wonder elephants face genocide in such a volatile ivory trade. The cruelty of poachers poaching for profit is even more chilling. Although most people engaged in poaching are Africans, their customers are usually Asian criminal gangs.
Many people think that elephants can survive without ivory, but in fact, the significance of ivory for elephants' survival is not completely clear at present, but it is generally believed that it is to let mammoths remove debris from the ground when foraging for plants, or to let males compete for weapons of their spouses. Perhaps elephants can survive without ivory, but poachers often kill elephants first and then saw off the whole ivory head in order to take out the whole ivory and steal it. Even baby elephants with immature dentin can hardly escape their clutches. These poachers will kill people if necessary. In order to protect local elephants and rhinos, African nature reserves will be equipped with anti-poaching armed forces, and soldiers are fighting poaching with their lives. Poachers are also armed to the teeth. When elephants are hunted, some people will die to protect them.
The attack on the target group of poaching is devastating. Elephants are in matriarchal society, and each elephant group has a matriarchal leader to direct the time, action route, foraging place, habitat and so on of daily activities. When a female elephant is hunted, the whole herd will lose its accumulated knowledge and face difficulties in survival.
If the loss of habitat is the biggest problem for elephants, the situation will only get worse. The fertility rate in Africa is the highest in the world. In the next 30 years, the population of Africa will double to 2 billion. In another 50 years, the population of Africa may double again. With the continuous expansion of the global population, the demand for space is also increasing. The ecological destruction and environmental pollution caused by population expansion are threats to elephants and all living things in the world, including human beings themselves. By 2050, 63% of the existing elephant habitats will be occupied by humans. In the Asian countryside where the land competition is more intense, the conflict between people and elephants is more obvious. One night's foraging by elephants is enough to destroy the annual grain harvest of many small farmers. In India, frightened or furious elephants kill at least 400 people every year. In this regard, mankind has chosen revenge. Wildlife authorities usually hunt these problem elephants. In Indonesia, oil palm growers poison dozens of elephants every year.
Rhinoceroses are also victims of illegal wildlife trade. Because rhinoceros horn is regarded as a precious and effective medicinal material by Chinese medicine, huge demand and extremely high profit (60,000 US dollars per kilogram of rhinoceros horn) push rhinoceros to the brink of extinction. In South Africa, a rhinoceros is killed every 2 1 hour simply because of medical lies. On average, 800- 1000 rhinos are killed every year. Only more than 25,000 rhinos live in the wild in Africa and Asia. Of the five existing rhinoceros species, two are endangered and the other three are also threatened. Rhinos have few natural enemies in the wild, except humans. Especially the white rhinoceros. At present, there are only five northern white rhinoceros left in the world, of which only one male is an old rhinoceros. In order to prevent being killed by poachers, the horns of these white rhinos were cut off by workers. It is sad but helpless to cut off the horns and make them look like another kind of animal. The rhinoceros horn, which is highly sought after by consumers, is composed of keratin, which is actually the same as human nails.
Elephant extinction may sound incredible. But humans have pushed mammals to extinction more than once. The saber-toothed tiger lived for 30 million years and disappeared forever within 2000 years after its first contact with humans. The same fate befalls one species after another, from mammoths and mastodons to ground sloths. If we humans don't stop plundering the environment, the fate of elephant extinction is undoubtedly doomed. The most optimistic situation is that they are driven to near extinction and remain in some city zoos and heavily guarded protected areas. Speaking of the consequences of elephant extinction, there seems to be nothing to think about. Is that people will never see the most familiar truth again.
Indeed, elephants have no natural enemies (except humans) in nature, and their extinction will not have much impact on the ecological balance of the food chain. If there is any impact, it is the life of indigenous tribes on the local grasslands in Africa. For example, the Samburu people in Kenya, the local education and the improvement of people's lives are mainly funded by elephant-watching tourism. Once the elephant is extinct, it will be a huge blow to the local economy. However, the threat of elephant extinction shows that millions of species are on the verge of extinction.
The reduction of species diversity has become another major problem facing the world today. It may not be as serious as water pollution and air pollution, but once diversity disappears, it will be difficult for human beings to survive.
Medicinal value and necessities of life
Biology provides human beings with food, fiber, building and furniture materials and other industrial raw materials. Doctors in traditional medicine have long relied on plants and herbs to treat diseases. Plants provide effective ingredients for modern medicine, such as ingredients for making aspirin. Not long ago, experts found plant components used to treat cancer in Pacific yew trees and Madagascar Catharanthus roseus. Perhaps, one day, we can find the plant ingredients that kill HIV from a plant. We searched for medicine from the earth's medicine chest again and again. If these medicinal plants are extinct, human health will be threatened.
air
Trees and other green plants inhale carbon dioxide, a greenhouse gas mainly produced by automobile exhaust and factory emissions, and then reduce it to natural pure oxygen. However, we continue to cut down trees, and now 4,982 species are in danger of extinction. Water is indispensable to all life, so biodiversity is also related to water resources. Biodiversity, different ecosystems purify our
water
Forests, soil and bacteria, streams and clouds work together-in fact, it is filtration that makes us drink water again. Coral reef deaths, large-scale mudslides, abnormal rainstorms and persistent droughts in some areas are all related to water. From the perspective of ecosystem, water is related to all kinds of life in the ecosystem. In many parts of the earth, people find that their villages and towns are vulnerable to floods when they cut down forests. When this flood came, it was fiercer and faster than previous floods. This is because trees can use their roots to keep water and soil. People don't consider biodiversity at all, or even the possible danger caused by storms, so they cleared all coral mangroves. Mangrove is a good buffer zone for natural rainstorm and an ecosystem with rich biodiversity. When they are cut down, this buffer zone no longer exists, whether for humans or other species.
Reducing demand is the most important thing to protect African elephants and stop poaching. The root of stopping poaching is to reduce the demand for dental products. One of the best ways to reduce demand is publicity. Remember Yao Ming's public service advertisement saying "No business, no killing" said no to shark fin? Since the advertisement was broadcast, the demand for shark fin has decreased by 50% to 70%. Talking about wildlife products is not something that each of us can and should do. We can still live a wonderful life without these animal products, so why do we have them? Not only don't buy it yourself, but also ask people around you to buy it and report it to the relevant departments when necessary.
Finally, I want to use the survival expert Bell? Greeles ended this article with a sentence mentioned in the British "Let's Talk" special speech-wildlife protection: