Gorillas in Africa will soon disappear

By:- Marianne de Nazareth *

Accelerating Impacts from Poaching to illegal timber trade reduces Great Ape population and habitats alarmingly

Every day there seems to be yet another species of flora or fauna at risk or thrown into the endangered list by uncaring human intervention. Now it's the turn of the Gorilla which according to reports from UNEPand INTERPOL, may disappear from large parts of the Greater Congo Basin by the mid 2020s unless urgent action is taken to safeguard habitats and counter poaching.

In earlier reports posted by the UN Environment Programme (UNEP), in 2002, the figure given was, only 10 per cent of the original ranges would remain by 2030. However like our Indian Tiger, these estimates now appear too optimistic given the intensification of illegal logging, mining, charcoal production and increased demand for bushmeat, of which an increasing proportion is ape meat.

Outbreaks of Ebola hemorrhagic fever virus are adding to the statistics of great apes including gorillas and researchers have estimated that up to 90 per cent of animals infected will die. The new report, launched at a meeting of the Convention on the International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) which took place in Qatar, says the situation is especially critical in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) where a great deal of the escalating damage is linked with militias operating in the region.

The Rapid Response Assessment report, entitled The Last Stand of the Gorilla – Environmental Crime and Conflict in the Congo Basin, says militias in the eastern part of the DRC are behind much of the illegal trade which may be worth several hundred million dollars a year.

It says that smuggled or illegally-harvested minerals such as diamonds, gold and coltan along with timber ends up crossing borders, passing through middle men and companies before being shipped onto countries in Asia, the European Union and the Gulf.

The export of timber and minerals is estimated to be two to ten times the officially recorded level, and is claimed to be handled by front companies in Kenya, Uganda, Rwanda and Burundi.

Militias-
Conflict as we know needs funds to sustain itself. Therefore, the illegal trade is in part due to the militias being in control of border crossings which, along with demanding road tax payments, may be generating between $14 million and $50 million annually, which in turn helps fund their activities.

Meanwhile, the insecurity in the region has driven hundreds of thousands of people into refugee camps. Logging and mining camps, perhaps with links to militias, are hiring poachers to supply refugees and markets in towns across the region with bushmeat. Achim Steiner, UN Under-Secretary General and Executive Director of the UN Environment Programme (UNEP), said: "This is a tragedy for the great apes and one also for countless other species being impacted by this intensifying and all too often illegal trade."

"Ultimately it is also a tragedy for the people living in the communities and countries concerned. These natural assets are their assets: ones underpinning lives and livelihoods for millions of people. In short it is environmental crime and theft by the few and the powerful at the expense of the poor and the vulnerable," he added. Mr Steiner said he welcomed the involvement of INTERPOL and called on the international community to step up support for the agency's Environmental Crime Programme.

He also underlined the importance of strengthening treaties such as the Lusaka Agreement on Co-operative Enforcement Operations Directed at Illegal Trade in Wild Fauna and Flora, which operates in eight Eastern and Southern African countries in support of CITES. Christian Nellemann, a senior officer at UNEP's Grid Arendal centre said the original assessment had underestimated the scale of the bushmeat trade, the rise in logging and the impact of the Ebola virus on great ape populations.

"With the current and accelerated rate of poaching for bushmeat and habitat loss, the gorillas of the Greater Congo Basin may now disappear from most of their present range within ten to fifteen years," said Mr Nellemann.

Ian Redmond, Envoy for the Great Ape Survival Partnership, established by UNEP and the UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), said clamping down on ape meat in the bushmeat trade would not harm local people. The report does, however, contain some positive news. A new and as yet unpublished survey in one area of the eastern DRC, in the centre of the conflict zone, has discovered 750 critically endangered Eastern lowland gorillas.

The other good news is that the mountain gorillas in the Virungas, an area which is shared by Rwanda, Uganda and DR Congo, have survived during several periods of instability. And this is the result of transboundary collaboration among the three countries, including better law enforcement and benefit sharing with the local communities.

This is also due to the efforts of courageous park rangers who last year, for example, destroyed over 1,000 kilns involved in charcoal production in the Virunga National Park. But this has come at a price - over 190 Virunga park rangers have been killed in recent years in the line of duty, with the perpetrators thought to be militias concerned about a loss of revenue.

Both UNEP and INTERPOL say that significant resources and training for law enforcement personnel and rangers on the ground must be mobilized, including long-term capacity building.