Fossil Fuel Extraction Threatens Africa’s Remaining Elephants
A Wildlife Article from All-Creatures.org

FROM Tzeporah Berman and Ina-Maria Shikongoi, Independent Media Institute

March 2022

Destructive oil drilling, fracking and new roads are coming to a UNESCO World Heritage site, putting endangered elephants at even greater risk.

Not in my home: A baby elephant with her mother. The Okavango Delta is home to Africa’s largest surviving population herd, but their migratory routes are threatened by seismic testing in the Kavango Basin. (Photo credit: Curious Ape)

The growing global outcry against the destruction caused by the oil and gas industry has pushed leaders to address their actions to fight the resulting climate and ecological crisis. Yet, the divergence between the ‘climate champion’ rhetoric—which was on full display at last year’s COP26 conference—and leaders’ concrete climate commitments needs to be scrutinized and put to test.

The fate of humanity—in particular, the BIPOC and fenceline communities who are bearing the brunt of the climate crisis—depends on the actualization of these commitments.

In a 2022 report, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change warns that climate change is the cause of “[w]idespread deterioration of ecosystem structure and function” across the globe. The fossil fuel industry is not only responsible for the polluting products that worsen the climate but also for destroying ecosystems in their search for and extraction of oil and gas.

That is exactly what is happening in the Kavango region in northern Namibia, home to many of Africa’s remaining wild elephants.

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Please read the ENTIRE ARTICLE HERE (PDF).

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