TERF Information
Problems Facing Wild Elephants In Thailand and Asia
1. Habitat Loss
2. Live Captive
3. Poaching
4. Human Elephant Conflicts
Wild populations of Asian elephants are declining rapidly throughout Asia. In the last century alone the geographic range of the Asian elephant decreased by 70%
It is thought that there are between 30,000 and 40,000 Asian elephants left in the wild, though this figure is largely based on guesswork. Once abundant throughout all of South Asia, elephant populations are now restricted to small and usually isolated habitat fragments dispersed widely across 13 countries. Continued habitat loss is the greatest threat to the species and is a consequence of expanding human populations, agricultural land conversion, large-scale commercial logging and deforestation. Poaching of elephants for their tusks or other body parts and live capture of young elephants for domestication are also severe threats.
In Thailand, wild elephants have suffered dramatic loss of forest habitat in the last century and are continuing to suffer from poaching, live capture and conflict with humans living on the edge of protected areas. Despite serious threats to the remaining wild elephants, only rough estimates of the population size exist and no systematic monitoring systems are in place throughout Thailand. The lack of countrywide population monitoring makes it difficult to assess whether Thailand’s elephant have continued to decline even after a logging ban has provided better protection to forest habitats in the late 1990s.
The long-term survival of Asian elephants is in doubt throughout Asia and in Thailand, and the lack of detailed scientific studies of Asian elephant biology, ecology, conservation and management is appalling. Few basic systematic studies on the ecology of wild Asian elephants have been conducted in Thailand or its neighboring countries. For example, published work on Asian elephant ecology and conservation has focused on a relatively few ranges in India, Sri Lanka, Malaysia, and Indonesia but not on ranges in Thailand, Myanmar or Laos. In addition, there is a stunning paucity of technical capacity, despite the fact that Thailand and Myanmar have some of the largest wild land areas with great potential for long-term conservation of wild Asian elephant herds