Animal Issues Digest: Spring/Summer 2021
Read the Spring/Summer 2021 edition of Born Free USA’s
Animal Issues Digest. This issue features articles about our recently released trapping report, our work to end fur farming in the U.S., news from our primate sanctuary, victories against wildlife trafficking, and more!
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by Alice Stroud in GNRII on June 04, 2021
What is the first image that comes to your mind when asked about the lungs of the planet? Forests? Nope – think
blue… something that covers 70% of the planet: the ocean! Oceans are a major carbon storage system for carbon dioxide (CO2), absorb about 30% of CO2 produced by human activities, and release at least 50% of the planet’s oxygen in the atmosphere.
The ocean is home to most of Earth’s biodiversity. However, human activities are threatening fragile marine ecosystems. Threats to oceans include climate change, which is making oceans hotter and more acidic, pollution (in particular plastic pollution), and overfishing. According to the UN Food and Agriculture Organization, illegal, unreported, and unregulated fishing activities are responsible for the loss of up to 26 million tons of fish each year, which is estimated to have an economic value of USD $10-23 billion.
Elephant ivory seized in Burkina Faso, May 2021. Photo: Born Free USA.
Born Free USA works in West and Central Africa to equip law enforcement personnel, customs officers, and others on the front lines of the fight to stop illegal wildlife trade with the tools, knowledge, and resources they need. These efforts are paying off in the form of large wildlife product seizures and the arrests of traffickers. The latest victory comes from Burkina Faso, where officials discovered and confiscated 14 elephant tusks earlier this month.
On the morning of May 11, the mobile customs brigade in Ouagadougou received information about a possible case of wildlife trafficking involving elephant ivory. The team organized a plan to ambush the traffickers, leading to an arrest at around 5:00 PM the same day. The confiscated tusks weigh 60 lb. (28 kg.) and come from seven African elephants, a species listed under CITES. The tusks’ value is estimated to be $33,000 USD (17,550,000 CFA Francs).
by Barry Kent MacKay in Canada, Coexisting with Wildlife on June 02, 2021
Born Free USA stands against trophy hunting anywhere and everywhere it takes place. That is why we oppose the Yukon Territory’s spring grizzly bear hunt. Spring bear hunting which Born Free USA has spoken out against in Ontario, where a spring hunt on black bears was recently reinstated risks leaving orphaned cubs, dependent on their mothers, to die of stress, hunger, or predation. And, while hunters may be restricted only to shooting males, an absence of cubs does not always mean that a lone bear in spring is a male, and eager hunters too often make mistakes.