The True Green Alliance’s view on the Endangered Species Day – May 19th, 2017.
Animals don’t organise themselves at the “species level” but at the “population level”; and the management of a species can ONLY be effected at the population level – and ONLY population by population. The respective environmental “pressures” that are exerted on each and every elephant population in Africa, for example, are unique to each population; and management applications for each of those populations are (or should be) designed around, and applied to, each population separately according to the nature of their respective environmental “pressures”.
When an animal species is classified as being “endangered” the whole world presumes that its every population is “unsafe” – but that is not true. Africa’s bush elephant (Loxodonta Africana), for example, occurs in 37 range-state countries and its 150 different populations are either:
(1) “UNSAFE” (declining and facing possible extirpation because the ’causes’ of the declines cannot be reversed);
(2) “SAFE” (they occur in good numbers, are stable or expanding, and in numbers that their habitats can sustainably support); or
(3) “EXCESSIVE” (they occur in numbers that their habitats CANNOT sustainably support; their habitats are, therefore, being ever more greatly trashed every day; and, as a consequence, the biological diversities of their sanctuaries are in free-fall decline). Excessive elephant populations (in my estimation) should be immediately reduced in number by, at least, 50 percent.
When CITES declared the African elephant to be an “endangered species” in 1989 – due entirely to unsupportable propaganda pressure from the convention’s mass of accredited animal rights NGOs – it demanded that ALL elephant populations be afforded total preservation management (protection from all harm); and the essential culling of safe and excessive populations in southern Africa stopped. What this declaration actually did, therefore, was to force MIS-management on the continent’s MANY safe and excessive elephant populations. In other words, it had a negative effect on the very species CITES purported to want to ‘save’.
A common sense appreciation of the concept “endangered species”, therefore, is that it is invalid. It is fallacious. But it is more than that! It is downright dangerous for wildlife.
The labelling of a species as “endangered” creates false impressions and unattainable expectations amongst the general public (and governments; and seemingly also amongst the world’s leading “conservation” agencies) to the detriment of the species concerned.
If the ‘endangered species’ label causes the MIS-management of safe and excessive populations; if it interferes with the application of appropriate management measures in the field; and if it forces on African governments unnecessary and unjust impositions (such as the banning of imports into the U.S. of legitimate elephant trophies procured in Zimbabwe), then it is a concept that should not be praised but maligned – and it should be discarded from the vocabularies of all honest wildlife ‘conservation’ agencies everywhere.
very interesting topic in my view.
I am not a trained person in topics and issues like endangered species; I ha a post grad diploma in engineering where amongst other concepts i have learned the concept of systemic approach and entropy.
In my view i believe that the total summation of different pocket of populations might render the overall population as endangered ; this is how i personally view it ; meaning like for instance the wild lion population in africa eg exctint in some areas of west africa ; abundant in tanzania and botswana ? so the total summation ( greek capital letter sigma?) will have some zeros , and other numbers from all different areas of the lions natural ranges or habitats ; so if one compares those sigmas over the decades i believe that in total they are on a downward trend ; that is for me a gross yet more simplistic explanation of endangered species eg wild lion in africa .
Now the concept of entropy will bring about the concept of systemic population ie the whole is greater than the sum of the parts ; so any sistemic “system” if left unattended will migrate from the states of control to threshold to brink of chaos to chaos ; in my view and example with the wild lion population unless there is an external influence or intervention at the state threshold the inevitable consequence caused by entropy will be the states of brink of chaos and then chaos which I would equate with endangered to exctint ?…. just some concepts as seen by myself.
In other words I would still use the word endangered in such a scenario .
Thanks for such interesting and education topics!
Joao, you miss the point. Wildlife is “managed” – and can ONLY be managed – population by population. The “endangered species” concept is applied to ALL populations of the same (prescribed) species and, when that happens, it effectively declares them ALL to be “unsafe”. This is FAR from the truth with most species – like elephants; rhinos and lions – which all have many populations that are quite “safe”. Nevertheless, the endangered species concept prescribes that they are ALL “UNSAFE” and therefore they are ALL deserving of TOTAL PROTECTION. This being the case, the “endangered species” concept enforces “preservation management” on populations that urgently need to be “reduced in number” (by culling) for their own good. So what the “endangered species” concept forces on certain identified species is often GROSS MIS-management – and that is contrary to “Best Practice” wildlife management.
Hope this explains my point of view more clearly?