In a first, the US government is looking to protect the world's tallest land animal under the Endangered Species Act. The US Fish and Wildlife Service proposed adding three subspecies of northern giraffe to the Endangered Species List on Wednesday, saying the West African, Kordofan, and Nubian subspecies primarily found in Cameroon, Chad, Niger, and Uganda, have declined 77% since 1985 due to habitat loss, climate change, human population growth, and poaching for local bushmeat and foreign trade, per NBC News and the Washington Post. They now number 6,000, down from about 26,000, including just 690 West African giraffes.
The FWS also proposed listing the reticulated and Masai giraffes of East Africa as threatened species. Those populations have declined 67% since the 1970s, leaving 45,400 and 15,985, respectively, per NBC. "Federal protections for giraffes will help protect a vulnerable species, foster biodiversity, support ecosystem health, combat wildlife trafficking, and promote sustainable economic practices," said FWS Director Martha Williams. "This action supports giraffe conservation while ensuring the United States does not contribute further to their decline."
The proposal would boost funding for conservation in the giraffes' range countries and require permits to import giraffe parts and products into the US, reducing illegal hunting and trade, per NBC. Nearly 40,000 giraffe parts and products were imported into the US in the decade that ended in 2018, according to the Humane Society. "If you want a giraffe-skin pillow, you want a giraffe-bone knife handle, any number of other things that people use giraffe parts for, that commercial market is going to be significantly curtailed," Tanya Sanerib of the Center for Biological Diversity tells the Post. The proposal is open for public comment for 90 days. (More giraffes stories.)
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