JFW interview in Boston Globe
Anna Mundow, correspondent for the Irish Times, calls Ivory’s Ghosts “lively and erudite. ” Her interview with me for the Boston Globe appeared on February 8, 2009.
Billy the Elephant Gets a New Home, New Role
Before my January 24th talk at the Los Angeles Zoo, I was privileged to be given a behind-the-scenes tour of the Pachyderm Forest, the elaborate new environment being built to eventually house Billy, the Zoo’s Asian elephant, and others of his kind that will be brought in to join him. And of course, I got to see how Billy was doing.
No matter how many times one sees an elephant—and I’ve seen plenty in the wild—the sight of their vast bulk, wrapped in the rumpled hide that seems to embody every mark of time, making them seem marvelously old, observant and patient, always evokes a sense of awe. Billy’s majestic, silent strides drew oohs and aahs from the zoo goers, who, like me, pushed up against the railing of his current enclosure for a better look.
The Los Angeles City Council’s decision four days later to allow construction to continue on the controversial, $42-million dollar Asian elephant habitat was the right one.
Opponents, who for months had rallied to shut down the project and send Billy away out of overblown concern for his welfare, were doubtless well-intentioned. But their attitudes and arguments amounted to misplaced animal advocacy that was oblivious to the need to educate the public.
Billy’s not a pet. He’s the ambassador of an endangered species.
There are less than 50,000 Asian elephants left in the wild, scattered across divided and shrinking habitats that put these animals in constant conflict with ever-growing rural populations that encroach on elephant territory, turning the pachyderms into crop-raiding nuisances. These animals need our respect and sympathy for their fragile future. Above all, they need public support for effective conservation policies.
Sure, Billy will still be confined, although soon enough he’ll be housed in a far more spacious and stimulating environment, complete with trees, waterfalls, and mud holes. He’ll have female companionship and will be able to breed, something he wouldn’t be able to do if he had been shipped off to lonely exile in a sanctuary.
There, he would be out of sight—and the plight of Asian elephants out of mind to zoo goers.
I’ve spent the last five years researching the relationship between humans and elephants for my book, Ivory’s Ghosts. Nothing in that story is more fundamental than the deep shift in thinking that turned elephants from bearers of treasure to creatures we find far more important than anything that can be carved from their tusks.
That shift has been reflected in constantly evolving zoo policies world-wide: elephants are no longer on view simply to entertain us. They are there to awaken our wonder at those we share the planet with, which is why zoos are continually upgrading all their animal exhibits to better reflect natural environments and underscore the place of wildlife in ecosystems.
A trip to the zoo is often the only chance an urban population has to experience the fascinations of the animal world first-hand. It’s where most city schoolchildren begin to appreciate nature and respect for the environment. And today, zoos also function as “land arks,” doing valuable research and conducting breeding programs for endangered species, such as the Asian elephant. Billy will now get to pass on his genes.
The sight of Billy striding quietly through the Pachyderm Forest or sinking into a deep pool to give himself a shower with his trunk, will do more to encourage respect for elephants and support for elephant conservation than sending him to a sanctuary could have ever accomplished.
JFW on National Public Radio
I was interviewed about Ivory’s Ghosts on the Faith Middleton Show on Connecticut Public Radio. The hour-long show was aired on January 22, 2009.
Thane Maynard, director of the Cincinnati Zoo, also interviewed me for his program, Field Notes, on WVXU. The 13-minute show was aired January 18, 2009.
Houston Museum of Natural Science guest blogpost
I was also invited to contribute a blogpost to the Houston Museum of Natural Science’s “Beyond Bones” blog before my lecture there:
http://blog.hmns.org/?s=ivory%27s+ghosts
“The Writing of Ivory’s Ghosts: The White Gold of History and the Fate of Elephants
As I prepare for a national lecture tour based on my forthcoming book, Ivory’s Ghosts, I know there’ll be one question I’ll get everywhere I go, including the HMNS on January 20: “why did you decide to write this book?”
In my case, the germ of the idea began with the realization that despite the nearly twenty-year-old ban on international trade in ivory, elephants are still being poached for their tusks. As a journalist and a conservationist, that bothered me. I began to wonder about the connection between the demand for ivory in history and its impact on the animal that has always been its greatest source. Was there something about this troubling, long-standing link that would throw light on the problems of elephant conservation in the 21st century?
Five years ago, I started researching Ivory’s Ghosts in museums and archives in the US and Europe, and then traveled to Africa to investigate elephant issues first hand, interviewing experts from South Africa to Kenya. I learned that ivory has been valued since the Ice Age, when humans carved figurines from the tusks of the woolly mammoth, the ancestor of the modern elephant—35,000 years ago! Even then humans were attracted to ivory’s beauty and scarcity, and its ability to be finely carved.
Throughout history, nearly every culture, from ancient Egypt to the US, used it to make small sculptures, furniture, combs, chessmen, and hundreds of other objects, a list that later included pistol grips, piano keys and billiard balls. By the late 1800s, ivory was the plastic of its age. Demand helped drive the slaughter of elephants, whose tusks were brought to the African coasts on the shoulders of slaves. By the 1980s, organized poaching, often carried out with AK-47s, halved the African elephant population, causing world-wide outrage that led to an international agreement (under CITES, the convention on trade in endangered species) banning cross-border trade in ivory.
But the ivory ban has failed to stop poaching. In Ivory’s Ghosts, I look into the reasons behind that. One is that the long-standing demand for ivory is not likely to disappear, at least anytime soon. The attraction to ivory is simply too ingrained in too many cultures. And poaching, not surprisingly, flourishes in countries that lack adequate enforcement, or are torn apart by war, like the Democratic Republic of Congo. In the absence of a legal market to meet age-old demand, the black market for ivory is flourishing.
Now some conservationists are starting to think what was previously unthinkable: returning to a highly controlled ivory trade, one that’s structured to help, not hurt elephants. After all, as long as there are elephants, there will be ivory.
Today, tusks are routinely recovered from elephants that die of natural causes, and stockpiled in the warehouses of wildlife departments and park services in dozens of African countries. What should be done with all this valuable “white gold?” Cash-strapped African nations are not about to destroy it. Instead, they have twice successfully petitioned CITES to be allowed to sell their legitimate ivory caches to raise funds strictly for elephant conservation. The last time was this past October, when Namibia, Botswana, Zimbabwe and South Africa sold over 100 tons of tusks, raising $15 million from CITES-approved buyers (Japan and China), who agreed not to re-export any ivory products.
The reason these countries gained approval for this sale was that they have well-managed elephant populations, and control poaching. In fact, Botswana and South Africa actually have too many elephants for the habitat available to them. Officials in South Africa’s Kruger National Park may even have to resort to culling some of their elephants if they can’t find other ways to keep their fast-growing herds within bounds.
It’s a situation that strikes many elephant lovers as contradictory—it gave me pause at first—but regular, highly controlled, CITES-administered sales might provide a means to support successful elephant conservation, strange as that sounds.
I look forward to sharing what I’ve learned about the fascinating, complex, and often troubling subject of ivory and elephants with the HMNS audience, and hearing their thoughts on the future of elephants.”
JFW Science Metropolis interview
Before my Harvard Museum appearance, I was interviewed by Joseph Caputo for the Boston-based blog, Science Metropolis:
http://www.sciencemetropolis.com/2009/01/15/the-ivory-trade-lives-o
“The Ivory Trade Lives On
Jan 15
Long before gold and gemstones, humans were drawn to ivory. Europeans and Americans were especially found of the material, considered the plastic of its age. It was used to make everyday objects from combs to piano keys. By the 1980s, elephant poaching reached record levels in East Africa, provoking a worldwide outcry that led to an ivory trade ban still in effect.
But that’s not the end of the story. The ivory trade still resonates today. Journalist and conservationist John Frederick Walker discusses the past and future of the ivory trade in his new book, “Ivory Ghosts: The White Gold of History and the Fate of Elephants.” He will be speaking at the Harvard Museum of Natural History this Saturday, January 17, 2009 at 2:00 pm.
What kinds of issues does the ivory trade continue to raise? Science Metropolis editor Joseph Caputo asked Walker about his research.
Q: Why are elephants still being killed for their tusks? Who’s buying it?
The ivory ban only governs international trade in ivory. It doesn’t have anything to do with the internal buying, selling, possessing, collecting of ivory within each country. In North America and Europe, there are vast amounts of worked ivory, that is ivory that’s been carved into something. The issue that is disturbing is that some of it might be masquerading as ivory that is pre-ban when actually it’s poached ivory being snuck into the country.
Q: What role does the online auction-site eBay play in the modern ivory story?
EBay, under pressure from animal advocacy groups, decided that the possibility that there might be some objects being sold on eBay coming from poached ivory was enough to convince them to shut down all ivory sales. I’m not so sure that’s going to help reduce poaching or the flow of illegal ivory. It was a very well organized and central site and that it probably could have been monitored for that kind of illegal activity.
Q: Why would officials at Kruger National Park in South Africa need to thin their elephant herds?
That disturbs a lot of people but they’re so used to thinking of elephants being persecuted in most parts of Africa. They don’t understand that in the southern tier of Africa, those countries have been very successful with their elephant conservation. They’ve had such success that they have too many elephants for the habitat that’s available.
In Kruger National Park, which is the size of New Jersey, has a population of over 12,000 elephants. The habitat there can only support about 8,000 unless you’re willing to let the park’s biodiversity deteriorate. Elephants can literally transform their landscape into a desert. They are slowly eating up the park and having a huge impact on the vegetation.
After much outcry and discussion, park officials have decided they cannot take culling off the list of possible management techniques. They will use it as a last resort if there’s no other way to bring their numbers under control. But, it’s almost certain that they’re going to have to do that.
Q. Is there a possible end for the ivory trade?
I do not believe the ivory trade will ever end because as long as there are elephants there’s going to be ivory. You don’t have to kill elephants to get their ivory, you just have to wait for them to die. Their tusks are routinely stockpiled in the warehouses of African parks and reserves. Given its status as a desirable material in human history, many people around the world can’t understand why there’s anything wrong with the ivory that comes from elephants that die of natural causes.”
JFW on book tour, Part I
Tomorrow I’m off on the first leg of a national book tour, giving lectures at museums and zoos on Ivory’s Ghosts:
NEW YORK, NY
January 14, 2009, 6:30 pm
American Museum of Natural History
Central Park West at 79th Street
CAMBRIDGE, MA
January 17, 2009, 2 pm
Harvard Museum of Natural History
26 Oxford Street
HOUSTON, TX
January 20, 2009, 6:30 pm
Houston Museum of Natural Science
One Herman Circle Drive
DENVER, CO
January 22, 2009, 7 pm
Denver Museum of Nature & Science
2001 Colorado Blvd
LOS ANGELES, CA
January 24, 2009, 3 pm
Los Angeles Zoo
5333 Zoo Drive
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National Geographic Adventure review of Ivory’s Ghosts
In the December 2008/January 2009 issue of National Geographic Adventure, Anthony Brandt has a review of Ivory’s Ghosts. Here’s an excerpt:
“…the author is a specialist in the megafauna of Africa, and this book is an invaluable primer on African conservation policy. Walker has been all over the continent, sifting the wisdom of the most eminent elephant behaviorists, from Ian Whyte at Kruger to Iain Douglas-Hamilton, the guiding force behind Save the Elephants. While Walker doesn’t pretend to offer definitive answers to the threats these pachyderms face, understanding the importance of the issues he raises is critical to the survival of more than elephants. In this comprehensive work with a serious message, there is never a dull moment.”
eBay ivory sales controversy
Science journalist Brendan Borrell has an article in Slate (“eBay and Ivory,” Nov. 13, 2008) that asks if the auction site’s recent ban on ivory products will actually help elephants. His incisive examination references Ivory’s Ghosts along the way, and ends with some fresh ideas on tracking ivory sales. Here’s an excerpt:
“Wild elephants are never going to be tolerated in Africa so long as locals cannot profit from the animals’ most valuable asset: those 120-pound teeth. As journalist John Frederick Walker argues in his provocative new book, Ivory’s Ghosts: The White Gold of History and the Fate of Elephants (to be published in January), the high regard with which American zoo-goers hold these proboscideans is not shared by poverty-stricken farmers in Kenya, who must contend with 4-ton living bulldozers rampaging their cassava fields and threatening their lives. Flip through African newspapers, and you’ll find lurid headlines describing trampled schoolchildren, panicked villagers, and nightly curfews. Americans would not put up with life under those conditions, yet we have imposed this imperial vision on a far-off continent that we imagine as our private zoo.”
Read the entire article at:http://www.slate.com/id/2204526/
John Frederick Walker 
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