At a party on a beautifully balmy night in Ibiza, after learning I was an environmentalist, a stranger threw unsubstantiated and factually incorrect climate change denial nonsense at me for about twenty minutes. About an hour later this same stranger apologised for his behaviour. “Being an environmentalist you must have been very upset by my outburst” he explained. “Not at all” I replied in friendly party mode. “Why would I be upset? I’ll be gone when it gets really bad and I don’t have any children. Do you?” By the shock on his face I guess he had. Great Al Jazeera "Earthrise" 20 minute episode on the Paris Climate Change talks starting today. I’m not one for scare tactics, they often backf
An elephant dies about every twenty minutes in Africa yet the main culprits still don’t act as if there is any urgency. China, the world’s biggest ivory market has announced it will ban its domestic ivory market and trade in a “timely” manner. It has been suggested this may be in a year’s time although phase outs and compensation are being discussed. Hong Kong states for the first time it is “open-minded” to calls for it to do the same. Thailand, although banning African ivory has set up a registration process which threatens to open up a massive ivory laundry. Save the Elephants' David Daballen reports another poached elephant in Samburu, Kenya 2011 © Dave Currey / EIA It’s been clear to
“It’s just sitting there, worth a fortune” explained a frustrated and committed wildlife warden in South Africa. We were sharing a beer around a fire, the cool night air providing a celestial display only seen in the bush. “Our work is starved of funds. Sell the ivory and we can use it for conservation.” It was the 1990s. Across the border in south-eastern Zimbabwe we visited a wildlife conservancy, restored from a cattle ranch where a bore-hole and water pump had recently been installed for the local community. I was told a few elephants were hunted each year by rich Americans and Europeans who funded the community and restoration project with their fees. “We need trade. They have to be ab
