Kenya wins as Geneva meet upholds ivory ban stays

KWS officers arrange elephant tusks for burning at Nairobi National Park on April 20, 2016. FILE PHOTO | NMG 

By Samuel Baya
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Kenya has remained tight-lipped on the number of its elephants and rhinos killed by poachers last year even after it rallied other nations to reject an open trade in animal trophies.

On Friday, Tourism and Wildlife Secretary Najib Balala moved the clock two years backwards to
declare a 2017 national stockpile of 9,930 pieces of elephant ivory weighing 55.9 tonnes and 91 pieces of rhino horns weighing 419.3 kilogrammes.

While the national stockpile mainly results from seizures at border posts and entry ports, unofficial sources indicate that Kenya also lost nine rhinos and 60 elephants to poachers in 2017.

On Tuesday, Kenya Wildlife Service officials would not disclose the number of elephants and rhinos killed in 2018, saying only the director general was authorised to do so and he had travelled to Geneva.

On Monday, delegates attending the 18th Session of the Conference of Parties to the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES COP-18) in Geneva voted down a proposal to open the trade in ivory stockpiles. The trade has been restricted from mid 1970s in effort to protect endangered elephants and rhinos. Tourism Chief Administrative Secretary (CAS) Joseph Boinnet who led the Kenyan delegation said the population of African elephants has continued to decline despite the ban. “I commend the delegation of Kenya in Geneva, and I would wish to thank our international friends. While it has been an excellent outcome for the African elephant at CITES COP-18, intense challenges in improving livelihoods, law enforcement, and closure of domestic ivory markets remains,” said Mr Boinnet.

The proposal to open the trade was being pushed jointly by Southern African Development Community countries led by South Africa, Botswana, Namibia, and Zimbabwe. In the end, Kenya and 100 countries or 81 per cent of the 125 treaty signatories present at voting rejected the proposal.

A communication from the Kenyan delegation attending the conference said that the shooting down of the proposal followed a spirited fight put up by Kenya with support from the African Elephant Coalition, the EU, USA, Latin American and Caribbean States and other like-minded countries. “This in effect means the ban on international trade in ivory continues to remain in place. At the same time, domestic ivory markets existing in some countries will henceforth be strictly regulated by CITES,” the statement said.