Black Friday and Small Business Saturday are in the rearview mirror, but Giving Tuesday is coming right up, and so is World Wildlife Conservation Day! Celebrated on December 5, World Wildlife Conservation Day was enacted in 2012 as a call to action to put a stop to illegal wildlife trafficking.
Many species of animals are under the protection of the Endangered Species Act, but that doesn’t stop those who think they are above the law from killing or capturing them. These people place profit over the planet. For example, in 2011 there were more than a dozen seizures of large scale illegal ivory shipments around the globe, yielding 23 tons of ivory. This is equivalent to about 2,500 elephants that were killed for their tusks.
The threat and dangers from these poachers reaches beyond just the animals themselves. Each year, park rangers, who dedicate their lives to protecting animals, are killed by the very people they’re trying to stop. In some parts of the world, local villages and economies are destroyed and disrupted when the animals that bring in tourists are killed or taken. Even outbreaks of diseases like bird flu can result from the unregulated shipping of illegally obtained wildlife.
What can you do? Most modern educated consumers know better than to purchase things like ivory. There are several artificial substitutes for this material, as well as furs and other animal products. By depleting and even eliminating the market for items like these, the motivation to slaughter these animals goes away.
You can also make monetary contributions to the wildlife organization of your choice, one that works to put an end to poaching, killing, and overfishing of threatened and endangered species. For example, donations to the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) go towards training and equipping the park rangers who are on the front lines of the battle to protect these animals.
So remember World Wildlife Conservation Day on December 5th. Make a donation in someone’s name as a meaningful holiday gift, or sign a petition to enforce stricter punishments and protections. A lot of small actions can add up to a big difference.
Images via USFWS Mountain Prairie
