Posted on 13 January
2013 | My name is Carlos Drews. I am the
director of the Global Species Programme
for WWF. I have studied animals and worked
in wildlife conservation for the last 25
years or so. Recently, I learned about the
invisible demise of forest elephants in
Central Africa, a large and charismatic
animal now threatened with extinction and
for which accurate counts do not exist.
The journey to Dzanga Sangha
I decided to travel
to Dzanga Sangha Protected Areas in the
Central African Republic as part of an inquiry
into the best strategy to halt their rampant
killing for the international ivory trade.
I had learned last week that despite the
devastating poaching wave across the Congo
Basin, not a single elephant was killed
in 2011 in this park. What had been the
reason?
The small 6-seater aircraft
took a small team of WWF conservationists
on a two hour flight from Yaoundé,
Cameroon over some 700 km of what I perceived
to be a by-and-large seemingly intact and
magnifiscent rainforest stretch in Southeastern
Cameroon. What I was unable to see from
the aircraft was the wave of rampant poaching
of elephants under the thick canopy that
has wiped out this species in various forest
pockets of Central Africa and that continues
unabated and fueled by a growing demand
for carved ivory products in Asia, mostly
China and Thailand.
First encounters
Upon arrival to the
park, the half an hour brisk walk guided
by knowledgeable Mr Mutingi, a member of
the BaAka people, led through cristal clear
creeks and trails under the shade of colossal
rainforest trees, eventually yielding a
very unexpected sight: not less than 95
elephants wallowing, digging for water and
socializing in a vast open area of clay
and sand.
I had seen elephants
in other parts of Africa before, but these
were different. Forest elephants are indeed
unique: they are visibly smaller than their
savannah counterparts, their ears are rounded
in shape and the tusks tend to be quite
straight. They have a toe less than savannah
elephants and their DNA is distinct enough
from these, with some scientists arguing
that forest elephants are in fact a separate
species altogether.
The elephant families
that I had before me varied considerably
in colour, depending on the composition
of the mud in which they had wallowed most
recently. I marveled at the lively sight
of young ones and adults, trumpeting and
rumbling in this well-known spot, but at
the same time felt uneasy realizing their
tremendous vulnerability to unscrupulous
poaching gangs.
Looming threats
I returned before sunset
to the camp to meet with WWF staffmember
Bryan Curran, the technical advisor for
the park. Dzanga Sangha is jointly managed
between WWF and the government. The seasoned
conservationist told me about last year´s
incursion of Sudanese into the Central African
Republic, a heavily armed gang of poachers
on horseback, heading towards the park over
hundreds of kilometers. WWF notified the
armed forces who intercepted the criminals
just in time to stop a mass slaugther of
elephants in the park.
Curran attributed the
success of zero poaching of elephants last
year to the significant investment in a
platoon of 42 ecoguards, resulting in over
10,700 man-patrol days that acted as an
efficient deterrent. Poachers may be focusing
now on neighbouring Cameroon and Congo,
where enforcement efforts are weak, turning
poaching for ivory into a low risk criminal
activity with very high returns. I was reassured,
however, to see today that there is still
a safe haven for forest elephants in Central
Africa. And tomorrow I hope to see a habituated
group of gorillas, benefitting equally from
the safety of Dzanga Sangha.
+ More
For law enforcers, confidence
is in the job description
07 January 2013 | By
David Higgins, Manager, Interpol Environmental
Crime Programme
Throughout my career in law enforcement,
first in Australia and now at Interpol,
I’ve learned that criminals are opportunistic.
They look for weakness to exploit. If one
country, or one agency within a country,
is not as engaged in combating crime as
others then the criminals will exploit that
opportunity.
Often environmental
law enforcement is not treated like the
profession that it is. We expect our scientists,
policymakers and lawyers to have advanced
degrees and be highly experienced. But our
enforcers, our rangers, we give them a one
week course, maybe two, then send them out
to the field to face criminals that are
often armed and dangerous.
When I went through
the law enforcement academy it took nine
months. At Interpol we conduct trainings
to empower environmental law enforcement
officers, to give them a belief in themselves
that they can do the job. It’s very hands
on. Arresting people or interrogating suspects
is not something I can teach in a PowerPoint
presentation. In a law enforcement recruit
course we teach you how to arrest somebody
and then we actually go out and do it.
When I was an officer
in training, I had learned how to put handcuffs
on people but when I had to do it on a real
criminal it was totally different. We were
just moving him from one jail to another,
some rather senior police colleagues were
there, and they told me to handcuff the
guy so we could transport him. I went up
to him – he was a big burly guy - and in
my little nervous 22-year-old voice I told
him to put his hands behind his back. He
growled a little and I stuck the handcuff
on, but then I realized the other cuff wasn’t
going to get to the other hand because I
had put it on wrong. And he started to laugh,
even my colleagues laughed.
I had been trained on
how to do this stuff, but it was my first
time with a real criminal and I was nervous,
so I had to unlock the handcuff and put
it on again while everyone laughed at me.
But I never made the same mistake again.
And I learned that it’s ok to make mistakes,
but we have to then do something to improve.
In our trainings we want to give enforcers
confidence in themselves that if they make
a mistake it’s not the end of the world
as long as they take the opportunity to
learn from it and don’t give up.
We also go out into
the field for operations, this year it was
Operation Worthy, targeting illegal ivory
traders. With the support of IFAW and the
UK government, we went into 12 African countries
to shadow the national law enforcement officers.
We provided advisory support, we didn’t
do their jobs for them, they did their jobs
and we provided the advice.
Initially you could
see the confidence wasn’t there. It’s quite
scary having all these people watching your
every move, film crews where there as well,
it was like having the chief of police watching
- imagine if he was there watching me with
the handcuffs that first time!
The teams were timid;
they weren’t sure how to act at first. I
felt that they just needed a success, no
matter how big or small. So we said, just
go out and catch somebody who is breaking
the law. Don’t worry about the ivory, just
get somebody.
We had some information
about a guy with snakes he shouldn’t have.
We went in to his house and he did have
a heap of snakes! And bang, they got their
success. From then on you couldn’t hold
them back. Off they went and within a day
they had arrested three people for illegal
ivory trade. For the first day and a half
there was nothing because they needed that
win, they needed something to bring them
together and to build upon as a team. After
that breakthrough they had the confidence
they needed to do the job and they’ve kept
it up since we’ve left.
At Interpol, and as
an international community, we can help
with management, strategy, vision and government
engagement, but it’s great when I get to
see people on the ground putting in the
hard yards. We had a part to play in giving
them their confidence, but at the end of
the day it’s the law enforcement professionals
on the ground who are responsible for the
success.
