Elephant

Human-elephant conflict leads not only to negative interactions and loss of income, property, and lives, but also reduces community tolerance for conserving elephants. Addressing complex issues like human-wildlife conflict requires approaches that not only reduce the immediate impacts of negative interactions but also addresses the drivers and root causes of the conflict. WWF works with various stakeholders—particularly wildlife managers and communities—to incorporate tools and technologies, such as electric fencing, deterrents, and other tools, to prevent potentially harmful encounters. We also engage in efforts to educate communities that lead to behavior change that will minimize negative impacts. We help community response teams to respond to instances of human-elephant conflict and work with communities to develop alternative livelihood opportunities to help minimize economic impacts from crop loss. To reduce human-wildlife conflict in the long term, WWF works with governments and other stakeholders to address the root causes of human-elephant conflict, such as habitat loss and fragmentation and unplanned development.

Community and government rangers and game guards help protect endangered species like elephants and WWF helps train and equip them. In the Kavango Zambezi Transfrontier Conservation Area (KAZA), the world's largest terrestrial conservation landscape, which harbors more than half of Africa's elephants, WWF aims to secure a future for these animals and other wildlife by supporting the work of the KAZA Secretariat and the five KAZA partner countries (Angola, Botswana, Namibia, Zambia, and Zimbabwe) and their local communities through better protection, increasing the knowledge of their seasonal movements, and promoting community-based conservation initiatives, in collaboration with the private sector. WWF trains rangers in elephant monitoring and antipoaching techniques and works with communities to manage and reduce conflict with elephants.

At the borders of Cambodia and Vietnam, WWF works with park staff to patrol protected areas and assess elephant distribution and numbers. In this transboundary landscape, WWF works to protect and enable movement of the elephant population, of which the population on the Vietnam side is significant and the largest remaining wild elephant population in the country.

WWF works with TRAFFIC, the international wildlife trade monitoring network, to reduce the major threat that illegal and illicit domestic ivory markets pose to wild elephants. TRAFFIC also manages a global record of ivory seizures, called the Elephant Trade Information System (ETIS), that helps to identify routes and countries of particular importance in illegal trade.

To help wildlife inspectors, law enforcement, and researchers distinguish between different types of ivory and help identify illegally trafficked ivory products, WWF published the Identification Guide for Ivory and Ivory Substitutes, at the request of, and funded by, the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES), in partnership with TRAFFIC and ivory identification experts from the USFWS Forensic Laboratory. It serves as an objective, scientific resource for identifying the most commonly found ivories and artificial substitutes in trade.

China's elephant ivory ban is a historic milestone in the ongoing effort to save an iconic species. But with China’s markets closed, markets elsewhere remain open and continue to attract consumers. And as more and more Chinese travel internationally—nearly 200 million Chinese tourists travel abroad each year—incidents of elephant ivory smuggling are on the rise. WWF is working directly with these countries to support the closing of their elephant ivory markets and leverage international policy and diplomacy channels. A big focus for WWF is also changing consumer behavior to reduce elephant ivory purchasing and create a new norm that elephant ivory is not socially acceptable. We are working with leading online retailers, social media platforms, tourism companies, and creative agencies. Strong partnerships are already in place with the travel and e-commerce sectors, with commitments to avoid promoting, handling, or selling elephant ivory. WWF is also working with a leading market research firm to conduct annual surveys of consumers to better understand consumer attitudes and desire for elephant ivory so that we can change social norms around ivory and reduce demand. Through this research, we are able to identify demographics of elephant ivory purchasers and consumers, understand their underlying motivations, and develop effective strategies to influence them.

WWF works with elephant range state governments, local people, and non-governmental partners to secure a future for this keystone species by thinking beyond protected areas. Although significant elephant populations are now confined to well-protected areas, less than 20% of African elephant habitat is under formal protection. In Asia, on average, 70% of the wild elephant population lives outside protected areas. We advocate for large conservation landscapes like KAZA, which is located in southern Africa and is the largest terrestrial transboundary conservation area in the world. Home to around 225,000 elephants, we work to maintain this space to provide elephants freedom to roam.