Where the former is a hoax and a mere self congratulatory PR exercise by someone I now rather not name (I think a repeat of that discourse is totally unnecessary) and with no conservation value versus the second would signal and carry an important precedent and be very much needed from a conservation point of view for ex situ management and as ambassadors for their conspecifics in the wild. Remember that much of the monies raised for conservation of large megavertebrates in situ are not backed up by local funds but by major outside range donors and in particular zoos with elephants. Viz f.i. the Mali elephant project that West Midlands is involved in.
All well and good elephants need to remain in the wild, but for those few hundred in zoos across the globe that is very much a minor figure. What those in situ need to address primarily is to see to it that elephants are no longer seen as a wildlife conflict issue but very much a representative of the natural world equal rights in nature as ourselves, if not more so. It is usually the people versus wildlife card that is played and not what came first .... the chicken or the eggs (in this case the elephants). In other words safe spaces for wild elephants are very much needed and uninterrupted migration routes (often killed off by roads, railnetwork or simply boundaries of farms and plantations. That will never be resolved by pretending that a CITES moratorium on exports ex situ is the solution to securing a safe status for African elephants in the Savannah or Bush.
