A group of students in British Columbia has created a hi-tech system that is providing park rangers with a new tool to save threatened African elephants.
PhD candidate Jake Wall and his colleagues at the conservation group Save the Elephants designed a system that beams live satellite data and alerts rangers to poaching and to elephants in distress.
So far, about 100 elephants have been outfitted with satellite-tracking collars that let rangers monitor the animals live on Google Earth.
The system alerts rangers to changes in behaviour that might indicate an elephant is in distress or has fallen prey to poachers in pursuit of the elephants’ ivory tusks.
Mr. Wall says the system has already allowed the team to treat injured elephants and exposed poaching incidents.
According to The Nature Conservancy, an environmental group, poaching for ivory has reached record levels. It says tens of thousands of elephants are being killed for their tusks every year.
Time Magazine reported earlier this month that Nigeria and Angola sell the greatest amount of ivory products in Africa
It says the price African ivory brings in China has tripled in the past four years. That has resulted in dissident militias and organized-crime groups that monopolize the trade to ramping up illicit poaching.
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