Help Kenya sustain advocacy on total ban on international ivory and rhino horn trade - new envoys urged

Mother and calf elephants in Tsavo West National Park.

Ag. Director General William Kiprono asked the diplomats to help in demand reduction campaign on wildlife and wildlife products. Kenya Wildlife Service has urged 32 newly-appointed ambassadors, high commissioners and heads of missions to help Kenya sustain advocacy on total ban on international ivory and rhino horn trade.

Ivory, rhino horns, reptiles, pangolins, and sandal wood are some of the wildlife and wildlife products being poached and trafficked for international black markets.

While addressing their induction programme at KWS headquarters, Mr Kiprono asked them to use their diplomatic missions to lobby other countries to help reduce the demand for endangered species. 

Africa range states have faced unprecedented poaching in recent past with 302 elephants and 59 rhino poached in year 2013 in Kenya alone.  Since the beginning of the year, 116 elephants and 26 rhinos to poachers has been lost to poachers.

“In the last six months, however, we have turned the corner and the worst is behind us. We hope to keep the poaching cartels on the run and make them face the fullest extent of the law,” he said. He said that the government is fully aware of the magnitude of wildlife crime and has mobilised resources locally and internationally to curb the vice.

Besides poaching, he pointed habitat loss, human wildlife conflict due to growth in human population and climate change as other challenges facing wildlife conservation in the 21st century.

He urged the diplomats to use their missions to encourage international community to invest in conservation areas and assure tourists that Kenya’s national parks and the country are safe destinations. 

Among the newly appointed diplomats is former Finance Cabinet Minister Robinson Githae, who becomes the new Kenyan ambassador to the United States while Prof. Sam Ongeri heads to UN Habitat. The envoys were appointed in August 2014.

Donation: KWS receives DNA extraction equipment

Ms. Oriana Zoghbi (L), QIAGEN Business Manager and Commercial Partner – EMEA, hands over a DNA extraction equipment to Ag. Director General Mr. William Kiprono (R) for use at Forensics and Genetic Laboratory at KWS headquarters on Wednesday (September 24, 2014). The machine will be used to help counter poaching and enhancing disease investigation and surveillance among wildlife.

Bio-Zeq Kenya and its partner QIAGEN has donated a DNA extraction equipment - automated nucleic acid extraction machine - to Kenya Wildlife Service (KWS) to help counter poaching and enhancing disease investigation and surveillance among wildlife. 

Poaching is one of the most serious crimes investigated by wildlife forensics. The modern DNA-based molecular methods will aid in the fight against the poaching of endangered and protected species, and in the prevention of cruelty to animals through the new Wildlife Forensic laboratory based at Kenya Wildlife Service.

The DNA extraction equipment will be used in the Forensics and Genetic Laboratory when commissioned later this year. KWS commissioned the construction of the lab at its headquarters in July 2012.

During the handing over ceremony at KWS headquarters on Wednesday (September 24, 2014), Ms. Oriana Zoghbi, QIAGEN Business Manager and Commercial Partner – EMEA, congratulated KWS for the establishment of the forensic laboratory and its efforts to tackle poaching menace.

Ag. Director General Mr. William Kiprono welcomed the donation and said it will go a long way in enhancing prosecution through forensic investigations.

“Wildlife forensics based on DNA analysis will enhance our investigations on wildlife crimes and lead to convictions of offenders,” he said.

Besides, the laboratory shall be undertaking DNA sampling and profiling of poached wildlife and products seizures under the rhinoceros DNA Index system (RhODIS) and other mapping in partnership with University of Pretoria – Veterinary Genetics Laboratory (UP-VGL) with funding from WWF.

Once the forensic laboratory becomes operational, all live rhinos and other species, poached cases and existing stock piles will be profiled within the collaboration framework with UP-VGL.

QIAGEN is a leader in life science technologies and provides automated platforms for high through put for sample processing and analysis. Its technology provides key techniques, for example, automated nucleic acid extraction, pathogen detections, gene expression analysis, genotyping, mutation detection among others.

UNEP PRAISES KENYA’S NEW WILDLIFE LAW

ACTS Cover page Wildlife Conservation

Kenya’s efforts to fight poaching and illegal trade in wildlife have been recognized by the United Nations.

Mr. John E. Scanlon, the United Nation’s Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) Secretary-General, noted that Kenya had passed a law with stiffer penalties against poachers and wildlife traffickers.  

He was speaking in Guangzhou, China today where he had gone to witness the destruction of confiscated ivory tusks and carvings as part of efforts to raise awareness of elephant poaching.

Mr Scanlon said: “And just ten months after the conclusion of CITES CoP16, we are seeing enhanced measures taken across range, transit and destination States - such as in Kenya where new wildlife laws that impose significantly higher penalties for those involved in wildlife crime have been assented to by President Kenyatta, and in Malaysia where the Department of Wildlife and National Parks has filled 43 new posts for enforcement and prosecution.”  

Officials in Guangzhou, Guangdong Province, pulverized 6.1 tons of confiscated tusks and carvings in an event attended by representatives from 10 countries including the UK, and elephant states including Kenya, Gabon, and Tanzania. 

The function was also attended by the Kenyan Ambassador to China, HE Kinyanjui, Assistant Director for International Affairs, US Fish &Wildlife Service Mr Brian Arroyo and high-ranking Chinese environment officials.  The burning of the 6.1 tonnes of ivory stockpiled over the years marks the first major commitment by the Chinese government to publicly fight the multi-billion-dollar illegal wildlife trade. 

In a letter addressed to the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) last week, China invited representatives from foreign embassies, international organizations, and government departments to witness the event.

The Department of International Co-operation and the State Forestry Administration announced the intention to burn illegal ivory and other wildlife products in Guangzhou — a major hub for ivory trade — after concerted international pressure to close its market for animal trophies.

China has prepared and is implementing its comprehensive National Ivory Action Plan, as agreed with the CITES Standing Committee. The Plan has been shared with the Committee, which will discuss it and the other seven plans in July. 

Amongst other initiatives, China led the first cross-continent wildlife enforcement effort known as Operation Cobra, has agreed collaborative enforcement-related initiatives through the U.S.-China Strategic and Economic Dialogue, and most recently China (Hong Kong SAR) returned seized ivory and rhino horn to South Africa.  China has also provided funding to the African Elephant Fund and MIKE, and in-kind support to African range States, which will be further enhanced over the coming year.  

Kenya’s proposal to fight poaching of elephants and rhinos won backing during the CITES meeting held early this year in Bangkok,Thailand. The country has since submitted an ‘Ivory Trade Action Plan to reduce poaching & Ivory Trafficking’. 

 

This was after Kenya was blacklisted among the so called ‘gang of eight’ for fueling environmental crime within the region as a major transit and source country for ivory. 

The objective of Kenya’s national action plan is a collaborative effort to ensure elephant poaching and illegal trade in elephant ivory is reduced to the bare minimum.

The key thematic areas of the Action Plan are:

• Legislation and regulations

• Enforcement actions, investigations and national inter-agency collaboration and coordination

• International and regional wildlife enforcement collaboration

• Outreach, public awareness and education

• National reporting to CITES Secretariat and Standing

Committee