Poaching being one of the major causes of declining animals of the wild, and ironically, especially in the reserved forests, the human conspiracies against the giant mammals – elephants – have always been inexorable, to make their selfish ends meet.
Poaching, which has already pushed the Borneo Island’s pygmy elephants to the brink of extinction, did not seem to have amused the humans hankering for quick bucks. — Now, they are resorting to indiscriminate logging and commercial plantations, leading to the elephants’ habitat encroachment.
The exposure of the mammals’ prevailing endangered and vulnerable status by satellite tracking has kicked up worries among the conservationists.
A two-years-long satellite tracking by the World Wildlife Fund found that the island’s unique pygmy elephants are being deprived of their forests on flat lowlands and in river valleys generally preferred by both loggers and palm oil planters.
It is over the last four decades; about 40 percent of the Malaysian state of Sabah-forest has been unbelievably logged off or converted to plantation areas and human settlements. Unfortunately, this is the region where most pygmy elephants live!
It is “sad” that the pygmy elephants are falling prey to humans’ growing desires – be it short-termed or long-termed – just because of their preference for lowland forests, the source of more, better-quality food.- — And this, “ironically” is happening right under the nose of the much-claimed vigilance.