Patrick H. O'Farrell

When Cites sanctioned the last ivory sale in 2007, it was agreed that there would be no more such one-off sales for at least nine years, and Tanzania and Zambia are seen as having reneged on this. Their move has aroused resentment among other African states, which are now trying to protect their threatened and dwindling elephant populations with a motion for next month's meeting calling for a 20-year ban on any such sales, from the date of the last one. And delegates from the 23-government African Elephant Coalition have been in Brussels trying to persuade the EU Commission, the European Parliament and EU member states to oppose the new sale. " This really is the last call for the elephants in Africa, " said Bourama Niagate, director of parks and natural reserves in Mali. " The devastating poaching of the 1980s first controlled through Cites is now so prevalent that the African elephant is all but extinct in some countries. This is because limited legal sales of ivory were allowed in the recent past providing the perfect cover for illegal trade in poached ivory, " he says. Elephants once ranged widely across the whole of sub-Saharan Africa but are now found only in substantial numbers in the few southern countries with policies in place to protect them. In Botswana, elephant numbers have increased with conservation measures over the past 40 years to an estimated 130,000 animals. Zimbabwe says that it is now home to more than 100,000 elephants, but critics says this figure may be almost double the true numbers. And, of course, elephants cross national boundaries so are more difficult to census. Numbers of southern African elephants contrast sharply with those further north, where populations are facing extinction. " If we do not let elephant populations recover over the next 20 years by stopping the trade entirely, there will be no more African elephants outside a few zoological specimens in reserves in southern parts of Africa. Europe needs to do the right thing and back our stance now because it is nearly too late, " says Niagate. extraordinary amount, and again achieved the distinction of being a B-student without Bs. Ed Southin taught a magnificent course entirely based on the literature of the still infant field of molecular biology. My interests in physics went by the wayside — I was entirely hooked by the elegance of this science. …