Elefanterne jagtes for deres elfenben i det meste af Afrika af svært bevæbnede krybskyttebander, men nu får de hjælp fra “The Clinton Global Initiative”. De omregnet 440 mio. kr. skal bl. a. bruges til at træne og ansætte 3.100 parkvagter.
Hillary and Chelsea Clinton on Thursday deployed their mother-daughter star power to help the effort to save African elephants, brokering an 80 million US dollar effort to stop the ivory poaching which threatens the animals with extinction, writes Mongabay Friday.
The crackdown on 50 poaching hot spots in Africa involves several conservation groups and African governments.
But conservation leaders, unveiling the plan at the Clinton Global Initiative (CGI) annual meeting, went out of their way to credit Hillary Clinton for giving prominence to the issue of the illegal trade in wildlife while she was secretary of state (udenrigsminister).
“She has been directly involved. She personally reached out to a number of African leaders”, said Cristián Samper, president of the US-based Wildlife Conservation Society (www.wcs.org).
The CGI anti-poaching plan was the first big international cause championed by Hillary Clinton after she stepped down as secretary of state at the start of this year, after four years in the job.
Clinton gave prominence to wildlife trafficking as a national security threat during her time in the Obama administration. The White House has also taken up the issue, with a new initiative to stop poaching.
The funds now mobilized will be used
* to hire and train 3.100 park rangers at 50 sites in eastern and central Africa;
* to fund sniffer-dog teams along the top smuggling routes; and
* to train law-enforcement officials and judges responsible for prosecuting international trafficking gangs.
Vil rejse mange flere penge
The CGI is looking to raise an additional 70 million dollar (385 mio. DKR) for the anti-poaching plan over the next three years.
Stopping the illegal trade in wildlife will take a far broader effort than arresting individual poachers, the conservation groups said.
“The poor guy that goes out there with a gun, they are cannon fodder,” said Patrick Bergin, president of the African Wildlife Foundation. “We need to go higher up the food chain. There are people commissioning (bestiller) this ivory.”
About 285.000 elephants—or two-thirds of the entire remaining elephant population in Africa—live in the targeted areas.
The money will also be used to lobby for a ban on all commercial ivory sales until elephant populations are brought back to healthy levels in Africa, conservation leaders said.
Se også
http://news.mongabay.com/2013/0912-hance-christo-wilkinson.html
About the Clinton Global Initiative
Established in 2005 by President Bill Clinton, the Clinton Global Initiative (CGI), an initiative of Bill, Hillary & Chelsea Clinton Foundation, convenes global leaders to create and implement innovative solutions to the world’s most pressing challenges.
CGI Annual Meetings have brought together more than 150 heads of state, 20 Nobel Prize laureates, and hundreds of leading CEOs, heads of foundations and NGOs, major philanthropists, and members of the media.
To date CGI members have made more than 2.300 commitments, which are already improving the lives of more than 430 million people in over 180 countries.
When fully funded and implemented, these commitments will be valued at 76,7 billion dollar.
Kilde: CGIs netsted
Mere om Clinton Global Initiative på
http://www.clintonglobalinitiative.org
