African Elephant

WWF’s African Elephant program

This giant bull is going through the final stage of having a radio-collar that will help studies on elephant movement and distribution within the Congo Basin region.
© WWF CARPO/Peter Ngea

In 2000, WWF launched a new African Elephant Program. With 40 years of experience in elephant conservation, WWF aims to conserve forest and savanna elephant populations across Africa by supporting projects that improve protection and management, building capacity within range states, mitigating human-elephant conflict and reducing illegal trade. Given the breadth of elephant range, cross-border cooperation between governments is vital to successful conservation. Along with our partners, WWF is encouraging regional cooperation throughout Africa.

Monitoring forest elephants

WWF continues to work with the North Carolina Zoo and the government of Cameroon to monitor elephants. Radio-tracking studies have shown that animals spend at least 80% of their time outside protected areas, highlighting the need to work with local stakeholders to manage wildlife in buffer zones.

The results of the MIKE (Monitoring the Illegal Killing of Elephants) surveys in Central Africa have provided baseline data on key elephant populations. This includes elephant hotspots, areas where there is a high density of elephant populations and areas where poaching activities are taking place. Such information makes it possible for WWF and partners to prioritize specific sites and issues for intervention.

Mitigating conflict

One of WWF’s priorities for elephants in the Congo River Basin is to mitigate human-elephant conflict in several key sites. These conflicts are increasingly common where humans expand their agricultural activities to the detriment of forests - the natural habitat of elephants. Squeezed into increasingly smaller natural spaces and lured close to settlements by the crops planted by humans, endangered elephants have become an economic and safety problem in many places.

Small farmers who are often desperately poor and already economically and nutritionally vulnerable are forced by circumstances to encroach into elephant habitat. They can lose their entire livelihood and sometimes even their lives from an elephant raid.

In places like Campo Ma'an National Park in Cameroon, WWF is monitoring interactions between humans and elephants and training villagers to reduce conflict with elephants. Another focus of WWF is capacity building. Hundreds of people have received training in elephant management issues such as law enforcement, elephant population monitoring and human-elephant conflict mitigation.

Keeping elephant poaching down

Where necessary, WWF is increasing anti-poaching efforts around protected areas harboring elephants, including Campo Ma'an, Salonga and Virunga National Parks in the Democratic Republic of Congo. In Cameroon, WWF is working towards establishing new protected areas in elephant range.

Spotlight: Coastal East Africa

Local women living near Tanzania’s Zaraninge Forest, Coastal East Africa
© Edward PARKER / WWF-Canon

Stretching for 2,900 miles, from southern Somalia to the shores of South Africa, there are few places on Earth that can match the vibrancy and diversity of life found in Coastal East Africa. With the highest concentration of endemic animals in Africa, the coast’s waters sustain all five species of sea turtles in the Indian Ocean and 35 species of marine mammals, such as whales, dolphins and the endangered dugong. Its terrestrial habitats provide refuge for wild dogs, black rhinos, red colobus monkeys and African elephants.

Here, WWF is saving the lives of elephants and local farmers by using "chili bombs", and shutting down the largest illegal ivory markets in East Africa.