GENEVA,  JOHANNESBURG— Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species secretary-general John Scanlon on February 29, 2012 reportedly expressed “grave concern” that as many as 450 elephants were poached in Bouba Ndjida National Park,  northern Cameroon,  during the first 60 days of 2012.  Earlier,  the Washington D.C.-based Environmental Investigation Agency reported the poaching of as many as 50 elephants a month in the Selous Game Reserve in Tanzania.
Elephant poaching appears to have accelerated following a record number of seizures of illegally trafficked elephant tusks, worldwide,  in 2011,  including 13 seizures of more than a metric ton of ivory,  up from six in 2010.  The tusks confiscated in 2011 came from at least 2,500 elephants.  “Some of the seized tusks came from old stockpiles,  the elephants having been killed years ago,” reported Michelle Faul of Associated Press.  But the leakage from presumably closely guarded ivory stockpiles indicated high-level corruption in the nations of origin.
Ivory poaching exploded across Africa after CITES in July 2008 authorized Botswana,  Namibia,  South Africa,  and Zimbabwe to sell a combined total of 119 metric tons of elephant ivory to China. Read more