One elephant hunter Ron Thompson has killed approx. 5,000 elephants.
The Campaign to Ban Trophy Hunting has issued a list labelled “the deadly dozen”. These are the 12 countries where the most prolific trophy hunters reside. As expected, the top of the list is the United States. In 11th position is the United Kingdom.
This position in the top 12 ranking must have been influenced substantially by a British businessman, Malcolm King, who is considered to be among the world’s hunting elite. He has won 36 awards with the notorious Safari Club International which promotes trophy hunting on the African continent.
Despite his age, 74, he remains a prolific killer of iconic species in Africa. One of his awards is the “grand slam cats of the world” and another is the “grand slam Africa 29”. Both require plenty of money and a desperate commitment to slaughter as many iconic African wild species as possible.
Despite the decline in elephant numbers on the African continent, exemptions to shoot elephants are being legally issued in large numbers including to the Chinese. Records indicate that China is claiming exemptions resulting in the killing of elephants at an annual rate is 16 times higher than that of British hunters. The Chinese are in Africa to exploit the continent for minerals to fuel battery production and other electronic products. Africa is doomed to mass exploitation and they will accept it because if corruption.
Trophy hunting has more fans than ever. There are now hunters from 50 countries shooting elephants whereas, in 1995, 20 countries produced trophy hunters. Since 1980, in all, 100,000 elephant ivory trophies have been taken home by hunters.
The well-known but ineffective treaty called the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (Cites) is, it is argued, being used as a cover for poachers and there are systematic failures in the official paperwork supposed to regulate this disastrous convention.
The deadly dozen ranking is as follows:
- United States
- Germany
- South Africa
- Spain
- France
- China
- Italy
- Mexico
- Austria
- Canada
- UK
- Russia
My thanks to The Times and the Campaign to Ban Trophy Hunting. I wish them great success but I have a terrible feeling that the game is over. You can’t beat big business. It’ll trample over everything in its path, even elephants.
