12 Leaders The EconomistAugust 10th 2019
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early 6,000species of animals and about 30,000 species of
plants are listed in the various appendices of the Conven-
tion on International Trade in Endangered Species (cites) to pro-
tect them against over-exploitation. But as cites convenes its
three-yearly decision-making conference in Geneva this month,
one animal, as so often in the past, will attract much of the atten-
tion: the African elephant.
The elephant is in many ways cites’s mascot. It was rescued
in 1989 from what seemed inevitable extinction after half the
population had been wiped out by poaching in just a decade.
That year elephants were included in cites’s Appendix I, under
which virtually all international trade in their products is
banned. The slaughter slowed. This month’s meeting will con-
sider competing proposals about how absolute the ban should
be, since in some countries elephant popula-
tions have recovered (see International sec-
tion). Countries seeking a modest relaxation
have a strong case to make. But it is not strong
enough. The ban must stay.
Understandably, countries that have done a
good job protecting their elephants feel this is
unfair. They point out that they have devoted
huge resources to the elephant, through the
costs of law enforcement alone. And the real burden of all this is
borne by poor local people who are in competition with wildlife
for resources, and sometimes in conflict with it—elephants can
be destructive. People and governments, so the argument goes,
need to have an economic stake in the elephants’ survival. The
ivory trade would give them one.
That’s why Zambia wants its elephants moved to the slightly
less restrictive Appendix II, which would allow some trade in, for
example, hunting trophies. Four other southern African coun-
tries (Botswana, Namibia, South Africa and Zimbabwe), whose
elephants were moved to Appendix II 20 years ago, want to be al-
lowed to trade in their products, which, despite the change in
status, they have mostly been prohibited from doing.
To understand why these reasonable-sounding proposalsshould be rejected, consider what has happened to elephant
numbers since citesmost recently authorised some legal trade,
when Botswana, Namibia and South Africa were allowed in 2007
to sell a fixed amount of ivory to Japan, as a one-off. Elephant
numbers started falling again. A survey conducted in 2014-15 es-
timated that elephant numbers had fallen by 30% across 18 coun-
tries since 2007; another estimated a decline of over 100,000 ele-
phants, a fifth of the total number, between 2006 and 2015.
Increased poaching was at least partly to blame.
These numbers suggest that the existence of even a small le-
gal market increases the incentive for poaching. It allows black-
marketeers to pass off illegal ivory as the legal variety, and it sus-
tains demand. The biggest market is in China. Last year the gov-
ernment banned domestic sales of ivory, but its customs
officials seize a lot of smuggled products—nota-
bly from Japan, which citeslicensed as a market
in 2007. For the poachers, ivory is fungible. If it
is hard to secure in Zambia or Botswana, anoth-
er country’s elephants will be in the gun-sights.
Congo, Mozambique and, especially, Tanzania,
have seen sharp declines. Unfair though it is,
countries with better-run conservation pro-
grammes are, in effect, paying for the failings of
those with feeble institutions.
In the long run technology can help make trade compatible
with conservation. In better-resourced national parks, drones
are used to make it easier for rangers to spot poachers. dnatest-
ing of ivory shipments can establish where they came from, and
thus whether they are legal. As prices fall and countries get rich-
er, both technologies are likely to spread.
The objection to trade in products of endangered species is
not moral, it is pragmatic. When the world is confident that it
will boost elephant numbers rather than wipe them out, the ivo-
ry trade should be encouraged. Regrettably, that point has not yet
come. And until it does, the best hope for the elephant—and even
more endangered species, such as rhinos—lies not in easing the
ban on trading their products, but in enforcing it better. 7The elephant in the room
Now is not the time to liberalise the trade in endangered speciesEndangered speciesin the capital, Srinagar, compared to a national average of 62%.
But, as Kashmir’s bloody history suggests, things can get
much worse. The potential demographic impact of the loss of au-
tonomy might be its most incendiary consequence. Many fear
that the removal of restrictions on ownership of land and prop-
erty by outsiders, which were embedded in its constitutional
deal, will lead to an influx of Hindu immigration. The gloomiest
Indian observers have drawn comparisons to China’s Sinicisa-
tion of Tibet and Xinjiang.
Lastly, there may be ripples beyond Kashmir (see Asia sec-
tion). Those of India’s north-eastern states that also have been
granted extra autonomy are worried that their own constitution-
al carve-outs may be under threat. And Pakistan has reacted to
Mr Modi’s move with a promise to “exercise all possible options
to counter the illegal steps”, which might include increasing
support for jihadist groups. Although it is incumbent on Paki-stan to clamp down on its proxies, the angrier Kashmiris are, the
easier it is for Pakistani warmongers to recruit them. That in-
creases the risk of military escalation—which, between two nuc-
lear-armed states, is a frightening prospect.
Mr Modi portrays himself as a leader who is willing to break
boldly with convention—from the botched withdrawal in 2016 of
most cash in circulation to the (commendable) abolition of in-
stant Islamic divorce on July 30th. He is emboldened by a tower-
ing majority in parliament, won in an election earlier this year,
and pliant opposition parties. Yet his shake-up of Kashmir is an
unmistakable signal of how he intends to exercise that power.
He might now turn to other Hindu nationalist fixations, such as
the construction of a temple on the site of a mosque razed by a
radical Hindu mob in 1992. Mr Modi is setting himself more firm-
ly on the path of zealous nationalism, ideological purity and reli-
gious chauvinism. It will lead nowhere good. 7