JOHANNESBURG: South Africa yesterday lifted a 14-year ban on elephant culling, allowing killing to go ahead as an “option of last resort” in managing the country’s swelling elephant population.
While acknowledging the huge affection in which elephants are held, Environment Minister Martinus van Schalkwyk said the growth in their numbers since the end of culling raised concerns for the environment and the safety of people living near elephant herds.
“We will (allow) culling in certain parts of the country...but there is no intention of wholesale slaughter,” the minister said, adding that the culling had to be quick and humane.
Van Schalkwyk listed five population control measures in the new Norms and Standards for the Management of Elephants, which will be gazetted later this month and come into effect on May 1.
Culling would only take place after the other measures - which include range manipulation (including creating “corridors” for elephants to move between areas), translocation and contraception - had been rejected by an ecologist, the minister said.
South Africa suspended culling amid worldwide protests in 1994. At that time the country’s largest game park, Kruger National Park, had 8,000 elephants.
Now it has an estimated 14,000, with a further 6,000 or so living in other parks and private reserves around the country.
Animal rights group were divided on the announcement.
“Yes, he did say culling is going to happen. What he did say is that this is not going to be a bloodbath,” Christina Pretorius, spokeswoman for the International Fund for Animal Welfare said.
“We’d really prefer not to see culling on this list but there’s a fairly rigorous set of checks and balances in place,” she said.
Elephant managers first had to prove there is overpopulation, then exhaust all other options and get approval from an ecologist before their request would be considered, Pretorius noted.
Animal Rights Africa, on the other hand, has already threatened protest action.
In the event of culling being reintroduced “we will appeal to the international animal rights community to use its not inconsiderable membership and corporate influence to support a call for tourists to boycott our national parks,” Animal Rights Africa said.
Van Schalkwyk said his department had consulted with experts for a year before drafting the new policy, which also bans the capture of elephants for use in commercial exhibition activities, such as elephant-back tourism or circuses. – DPA