中國中產階級的興起, 使高價的消費品市場興旺, 對動物和環境來說, 卻是一種殘害, 非洲大象就是一例, 因為近年中國對象牙的輸入大增... 估計每年會有四千大象因為象牙貿易而被殺...
節錄自 independent online
Burgeoning demand for luxury goods from China's emerging middle class is helping to revive the banned ivory trade in Africa, putting elephants back in poachers' sights, conservationists have warned.
Across China, shops are offeringconsumers items that only a generation ago were beyond their reach. Ivory is one of them.
"On a recent visit to China, I found twice as many shops selling ivory products than I saw only a few years ago," said Esmond Martin, a conservationist who has tracked the global ivory trade.
Chinese companies are making their mark, building roads in Ethiopia, buying up Sudan's oil, relaunching Sierra Leone's tourism industry. It is easy to see why; African markets are a huge potential source of profit for China's fast growing economy. But occasionally, trade goes in the other direction.
The boom in ivory is bad news for Africa's elephants. Ever since the global ivory trade was banned in 1990, most countries in sub-Saharan Africa have managed to reduce poaching. Some illegal trade has persisted, particularly in Sudan's capital Khartoum, and the battlefields of the Democratic Republic of Congo, but the difficulties of selling and shipping ivory around the world has deterred many would-be traders.
Now, with new demand booming in China, leading wildlife experts are concerned that the killing of elephants will again become a lucrative career choice....
A recent study estimates that 4,000 African elephants would be killed each year to meet this new demand in both Asia and Africa. As there are now estimated to be just 300,000 elephants in Africa, down from 1.3 million in 1979, this new wave of culling could decimate elephant populations. The killing is most likely to take place in central African countries, which do not have the resources to stop poaching....