Hà Tĩnh wants urgent protection measures for elephants

HÀ TĨNH — Authorities in the central province of Hà Tĩnh have recommended the formation of a project for the urgent protection of elephants in the province’s Vũ Quang National Park.

The Hà Tĩnh People’s Committee sent a proposal to the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development and the Việt Nam Administration of Forestry earlier this week recommending urgent measures to protect the elephants in the park from harm by humans.

National parks in the country are all controlled by the ministry and the administration.

According to the proposal, camera traps in the park photographed two herds of elephants several times, each with at least four elephants. Those pictures helped to prove the existence of elephants inside the park’s territory.

Habitats for elephants are narrowing year after year due to construction revamping forest land and the impacts of climate change, the proposal says. The elephants also face dangers from illegal poaching and attacks by angry nearby residents when they leave the jungle to find food.

The committee suggested a project lasting from 2019 to 2025 to implement urgent initial measures for the protection of the elephants as well as to recover their habitat.

Earlier, the national park conducted projects to collect genes of elephants and other species sharing the same habitats. The park has also worked to prevent conflicts between elephants and nearby residents as well as to stop poaching and illegal logging in the area’s elephant habitats.

According to a previous report by the administration, there were 75 to 130 elephants remaining along the border between Laos and Việt Nam. An updated report on the total number of elephants has yet to come.

The main habitat areas of elephants in the country are Thanh Hóa, Nghệ An, Hà Tĩnh, Quảng Nam and Đồng Nai. — VNS

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Singapore seizes 3.5 tons of ivory en route to Vietnam

The shipment arrived from Nigeria and could have fetched $2.5 million on the black market.

A huge shipment containing 3.5 tons of elephant ivory was seized in Singapore en route to Vietnam on Thursday, authorities said.

Officials said the shipment had arrived from Nigeria, the Strait Times reported.

An inspection uncovered ivory that could have fetched around $2.5 million on the black market, the report said.

Elephants are a protected species under the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora, of which both Singapore and Vietnam are signatories.

Vietnam outlawed the ivory trade in 1992 but the country remains a top market for ivory products prized locally for decorative purposes or in traditional medicine, despite having no proven medicinal qualities.

Weak law enforcement in the country has allowed a black market to flourish, and Vietnam is also a regular transit point for tusks trafficked from Africa destined for other parts of Asia, mainly China.

The country reported dozens of seizures last year, including one case in which three tons of ivory were found in the central province of Thanh Hoa in July.

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Tokyo woman, 77, leads charge to save elephants in Vietnam forest

Ethnic minority people and elephants have been living happily together like a family since back in the day in Vietnam's Yok Don National Park.

Elephants have been a great help for these people by carrying timber and doing farm work.

The biodiverse forest is also a home for wild elephants.

However, after the Vietnam War ended in 1975, many of the trees have been cut down to boost economic growth by harvesting timber.

Rampant elephant poaching for ivory is also threatening to wipe out one of the largest and most beautiful creatures on the planet.

A 77-year-old Japanese woman is inspiring local residents to protect the mammals.

“Destroying forests where elephants live will imperil human lives as well,"says Yoko Niimura, a former elementary school teacher who lives in Tokyo’s Kokubunji and has visited Vietnam since 2002 with the aim of protecting the elephants living in the Yok Don Forest.

Yok Don Forest, which straddles between Dak Lak province and Dak Nong province, is located in the heart of the nation.

It is believed that around 1,500 to 2,000 wild elephants lived in Dak Lak between 1975 to 1980, but the number had plunged to between 76 and 94 in 2004.

Niimura’s passion to protect elephants began after she encountered an elephant during a trip to Vietnam to take photographs after she had retired.

She was fascinated by the elephant striding strongly but calmly while carrying a mahout on its back.

She started taking photos of elephants and became aware of the harsh reality of the shrinking population of the animal, which have faced a risk of dying out.

She published a photo story book about the elephants in 2006 and established “Yok Don no Mori no kai,” a group to protect the creatures in the forest, in 2009.

The book was translated into Vietnamese by the group and 1,000 copies were donated to local children.

When she first set up the group to help the elephants, local people were not that bothered about their decline.

But now in the Yok Don Forest, an elephant conservation center has been established to protect elephants injured through poaching and to safeguard young elephants that have lost their parents.

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Mysterious herd of elephants marches out of hiding in southern Vietnam

A previously unseen herd of elephants has been spotted in Vietnam's southern province of Dong Nai, according to forest management officials.

While it’s great news for conservation efforts, it could be a curse on the family of 15, which includes four calves.

Officials believe that this herd has never been seen before, because the herd they have been tracking in recent years is led by a different male and only has one or two calves.

There’s low chance that the animals have given birth to more calves in such a short time, they said.

The news of the herd has been covered widely by local media and hailed as good news for conservation efforts.

But officials familiar with wildlife protection in Vietnam said it's not always a blessing. Media coverage about incidents like this helps to raise awareness about the need for protection, but it also alerts poachers to the animals’ location.

Dong Nai started a VND74 billion ($3.25 million) project in 2013 to protect the giant animals from poaching and deadly encounters with farmers.

Part of the project is an electric fence erected three months ago to keep them away from farmland and residential areas. Officials said the fence only gives a slight shock to scare the animals and does not harm them.

Nine elephants have died in the province in the past seven years, and one person was killed during an encounter with the giant mammals.

According to figures from conservation organizations, Vietnam’s wild elephant population has shrunk by 95 percent since 1975 to less than 100. At least 23 wild elephants have died over the past seven years, and nearly 75 percent of them were less than a year old.

Experts said that plantations near their natural habitats are a major threat to their survival.

The U.S. government has pledged $24 million to help protect Vietnam’s last remaining elephants by conserving their habitat.

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US pledges $24 million to protect Vietnam's last remaining elephants

Keeping people away from the giant mammals and their habitat is the only chance they have of survival.

The U.S. government has promised $24 million to the central province of Quang Nam to support elephant conservation efforts after multiple sightings of what is thought to be the last remaining herd left in the wild.

The money will be directed through the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), Ambassador Ted Osius said during a visit to the rural province on Thursday to attend the agriculture ministry’s opening of an elephant reserve.

The reserve covers nearly 19,000 hectares (47,000 acres) in Nong Son District, where elephants and their tracks have been spotted many times in recent years.

Since 2011, locals have been reporting sightings of elephants, some alive and others killed by poachers, as well as their footprints.

In 2015, when Quang Nam was zoned off to become part of an urgent elephant conservation program, a team of experts arrived and reported a herd of seven elephants with male, female and juvenile members.

A similar herd was spotted near houses on the edge of the forest in January and July this year.

“On one occasion, the elephants were just 50 meters from us. Their trumpeting was as loud as truck horns,” a local man said.

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Joint efforts called for to protect last wild elephants in Vietnam

No single country or individual could put an end to illegal wildlife trade, but joint international efforts should be made to prevent wildlife crimes and protect the elephant species in the centuries ahead, US Ambassador to Vietnam, Ted Osius, has said

The diplomat made the statement while addressing a talk held by the US Embassy in Hanoi, on August 11, in response to World Elephant day (August 12), under the theme “Please treat elephants well”.

In attendance at the event were Nguyen Dao Ngoc Van and Alegria Olmedo from the World Wildlife Fund (WWF), Rose Indenbaum from TRAFFIC, and Nguyen Thi Phuong Dung from Education for Nature Vietnam (ENV).

During the talk, delegates called for greater attention to elephants and their difficult living conditions, whilst discussing possible ways to preserve the last 100 wild elephants that remain in Vietnam.

The event enabled participants to understand more about the ways in which they could tackle the threats to elephants, through voluntarily joining wildlife organisations, supporting wildlife preservation efforts and raising awareness of the elephants’ struggle for survival.

Earlier on August 10, the US Embassy screened a film entitled “Ivory Game”, a documentary film featuring illegal elephant ivory trade, from the moment the elephant was poached in Africa to the moment when the elephant ivories were sold illegally in Asia.

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Dong Nai tests electric fence to protect elephants

A 50km long electric fence has been put into operation on a trial basis to prevent wild elephants from wandering into residential areas in Dong Nai province. (Photo: dantri.com.vn)

Dong Nai (VNA) – A 50km long electric fence has been put into
operation on a trial basis to prevent wild elephants from wandering into
residential areas in the southern province of Dong Nai, according to the
provincial Forest Protection Sub-Department.

The 2.2m high electric fence runs across Vinh Cuu district’s Ma Da and Phu Ly
communes and Dinh Quan district’s Thanh Son commune,.

Electricity is regularly switched on and off every one third of a second, which
helps keep the elephants at bay while not inflicting harm on them.

Along the fence there are many gates for local residents to pass through.

The fence was built at total cost of 85 billion VND (3.7 million USD) sourced
from state and local budgets.

Dong Nai province’s forest is currently home to about 15 wild elephants. In
recent years, there have been increasing conflicts between local farmers and
wild elephants as the animals approached residential areas and destroyed local
crops and orchards. In the past seven years, nine wild elephants died and one
person was killed by elephants.-VNA

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Measures proposed to conserve wild elephants in Dong Nai

There are 14 elephants living in an area of some 53,000 hectares in Vinh Cuu, Dinh Quan and Tan Phu districts, according to the province’s forest protection division.

Le Viet Dung, deputy head of the division, suggested two plans to prevent consanguineous mating among the elephants. The first is to ask for the Vietnam Administration of Forestry’s permission to bring some elephants in other localities to Dong Nai to mate with local ones.

The other plan is promoting international cooperation in the work, he said, elaborating that Dong Nai can mate its elephants with others in regional countries.

The elephant herd in Dong Nai was seen most recently in Thanh Son commune of Dinh Quan district in late March.

Local residents said the animals often come to their farms to find food, destroying a large area of fruit trees such as mango, cashew, banana and sugar cane.

The forest protection division is carrying out an emergency elephant conservation project with a total cost of 85 billion VND (3.75 million USD).

Accordingly, about 50km of electric fence will be built in Tan Phu, Dinh Quan and Vinh Cuu districts to prevent the conflict between elephants and human.

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Elephants in Dak Lak become more aggressive as loss of habitat continues

According to the Dak Lak provincial Elephant Conservation Center, there are five groups of elephants living in the province, with 60-70 in each group.

In Ea Sup district alone, there is one group of 30-34, while in Buon Don district, there are four groups with 30-36 elephants each.

A survey conducted by the center found that the number of elephant groups in Dak Lak has decreased.

A survey conducted by the center found that the number of elephant groups in Dak Lak has decreased.

Problems that threaten the sustainability of the elephants have also been identified, including an imbalance in the age structure and the ratio of male/female elephants.

The overwhelming majority of the elephants are old, while there are few young and mature individuals and more females than males. The factors will make it difficult to implement an elephant protection and conservation project.

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Vietnam to build sanctuary to protect elephants in central region

The number of elephants in Vietnam fell to around 160 in 2015 from 2,000 in 1980.

The central province of Quang Nam will build an elephant sanctuary between now and 2030, with an investment of nearly VND130 billion ($5.7 million), a provincial official said Thursday.

The reserve, which covers an area of 44,000 hectares (109,000 acres), is expected to protect elephants and expand their herd as well as other wildlife resources in Vietnam, said Le Chi Thanh, vice chairman of the provincial People’s Committee, the local government.

“In the future we will develop eco tours and other tourist sites” at the area to help raise incomes for local people, he added.

Funding is expected from the state budget and contributions of businesses and international organizations.

Last December, the World Wild Fund for Nature (WWF) and nature authorities kicked off an emergency project to prevent elephants in Vietnam from extinction.

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Declining forested land triggers elephant conflict

The continual erosion of forested land by local people has narrowed the living space for elephants in Dong Nai Province, leading to more conflict. In addition, the province’s elephant conservation project has still proceeded at a very slow pace.

Between 2009 and 2011, up to nine elephants died in the southern province of Dong Nai, which were initially suspected of being killed by people.

Recently, the only elephant in Tan Phu protective forest was also killed.

According to the forest management board, for many years, the elephants have destroyed sugarcane and crops grown by people.

Conservationists warned that if more elephants continue to be killed, the species faces extinction in Dong Nai.

Local people often use traditional methods to drive elephants away such as setting fire on cloths soaked with petrol or throwing small gas tank into them to cause explosions. However, these actions have made elephants more aggressive, which results in more conflicts with people.

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Vietnam launches last ditch effort to save its wild elephants

The giant mammals will disappear from the country forever unless poaching is stopped and their habitat is preserved.

International conservationists and Vietnamese forest management officials on Wednesday kicked off an urgent action plan to protect the country’s last wild elephants that involves better monitoring and law enforcement.

Around 60 elephants in Yok Don National Park, some of the last left in the wild in Vietnam, face constant threats from poaching and deforestation. As their habitat has shrunk, they have also come into conflict with farmers in the area.

The plan includes training for forest rangers, camera traps to monitor the population and educating locals about the animal’s movements to prevent clashes, according to a WWF press release.

The rangers will use a SMART (Spatial Monitoring and Reporting Tool) system, a data collection tool used at many nature reserves across the world, including the provinces of Quang Nam and Thua Thien-Hue in central Vietnam.

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Vietnam Uses Ultrasound To Establish Concentration Of Domestic Elephants

Domesticated elephants in Vietnam’s Central Highlands are receiving ultrasound scans by general experts to check their aptness for mating.

In a feverishness of a afternoon inside Ban Don Village in Dak Lak Province, a organisation of vets from Dak Lak Elephant Conservation Center (DECC) waited alongside Dutch elephant consultant Dr. Willem Schaftenaar for H’Tuk, a womanlike elephant who lives during a internal ecotourism resort.

H’Tuk had been scheduled for an ovarian ultrasound with a vets to establish either she was in good figure for carriage.

The ease and intelligent 36-year-old animal is among several trained elephants in Ban Don who share a common grief of a waste life though a mating deteriorate with their partners underneath a canopy of a woods.

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Electronic fence installed to protect elephants

ĐẮK LẮK – The Natural and Cultural Reserve in the Central Highlands Province of Đắk Lắk has completed building an electronic fence around the reserve campus to protect the habitat of elephants.

Huỳnh Trung Luân, director of the reserve, said an electronic fence was set up within 14 days with the support of technical staff of Việt Nam-based Animals Asia.

The electronic fence, with capacity of between 6.4kw and 8.4kw, will cover an area of some 6,000 sq.m. of the reserve, releasing the elephants from an iron leash and helping them integrate into nature.

The fence has a length of 1,320m, including five iron pillars and had four electronic lines, with 220V power lines and two large capacity batteries backup, which could cause panic for the elephants but not threaten their lives.

Luân said the electronic fence had been used effectively at many animal reserves around the world and would help the animals move freely and comfortably.

Currently, there are two wild elephants in the reserve.

In February 2014, a five-year-old male elephant was found trapped in a forest in the province. Its left foot was seriously injured and ivory was nearly fractured. The animal, named Jun, was treated and raised by the reserve.

This April, a one-year-old elephant was rescued by the reserve’s staff. It was found trapped under a well. The animal was named Gold and has been living in the reserve since then.

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