How many elephants are left on earth?
From Frequently asked questions about elephants:
Are elephants endangered species?
Theres about 600 000 African elephants, and between 30 000 and 50 000 Asian elephants. (Approximately 20% are in captivity) Its difficult to estimate their numbers exactly. The Africans dropped by 50%, from 1.3 millions to 600 000, between 1979 and 1989, because of poaching. About 8 elephants an hour (70 000/year) were poached during this period, until the CITES Ivory ban 1989.
The CITES ((Washington)Convention of International Trade In Endangered Species) regard both species as so threatened, so they are included in appendix 1. (the red list)In the Cites conference 1997, populations in Zimbabwe, Botswana, and Namibia were downlisted to appendix II.
This means that limited trade with ivory on quota, to Japan is ok. If a population in undisturbed, it grows with only 6%/year according to the IUCN (International Union of Conservation of Nature) elephant specialist group.
