ABSTRACT
This chapter presents a typology for understanding how the demand for wildlife products is created and sustained on a local and international level. It uses poaching of the African Elephant as an example of how this typology can be applied when analysing poaching problems and devising prevention measures. Low-cost techniques are capable of limiting access to elephants and decreasing poaching incentives. Any low-cost tactic should try to make it harder for poachers to find and kill elephants. In 1997, Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) adopted a resolution to create a comprehensive international monitoring system to track illegal trade in elephant products. This system is known as the Elephant Trade Information System (ETIS) and has been compiling country level data on ivory seizures since 1999. The analysis of ETIS seizure data for patterns in trade routes would allow a profile of transporters and their packages to be developed, aiding interception.
