World Elephant Day 2020 (12 August 2020)

World Elephant Day 2020

The day focuses on bringing the world together to help elephants and also inform   people and organizations about the threat that an elephant faces. Although, elephants are loved by most of the generations they are also on the verge of extinction.

World Elephant Day: History

On 12 August 2012, the first international Elephant Day was celebrated. Since then, it is observed annually and this day is dedicated to the huge animal protection and preservation. Let us tell you that in 2011, World Elephant Day was conceived by the Elephant Reintroduction Foundation and filmmakers Patricia Sims and Michael Clark. It was officially launched on August 12, 2012.

This day makes people understand the need for better protection for wild animals, elephants, and also to improve the illegal poaching and trade of ivory, better treatment of captive elephants. Do you know that now more than 65 wildlife organizations and several people around the world celebrate this day?

Let us tell you that in the IUCN Red List of threatened species, African elephants are listed Vulnerable and Asian elephants as Endangered.

Let us tell you that in the IUCN Red List of threatened species, African elephants are listed Vulnerable and Asian elephants as Endangered.

How is World Elephant Day celebrated?

The best way to celebrate the day is to educate yourself and others about this magnificent animal that is an elephant. It is necessary to raise issues that these animals’ faces and social media is the best platform for this. People watch documentary on elephants as this makes us realise about wildlife and about problems that animals face which can be an eye-opener. People donate on this day to a foundation dedicated to protecting elephants from poachers or relocating them to locations better suited their needs.

Union Environment Minister Prakash Javadekar released a document on Best Practices and launched a beta version of the portal on Human-Elephant Conflict on the eve of World Elephant Day. The National Portal on human-elephant conflict called “Surakhsya”. It is for the collection of real-time information and also for managing the conflicts on a real-time basis. It will also help to set the data collection protocols, data transmission pipelines, and data visualization tools to enable policy-makers to leverage HEC data for policy formulation and preparation of Action Plans for mitigation of conflicts.