ing abilities, they were trained for domestic purposes. Kings first used elephants to help fight wars through the dense jungles. Over time, elephants came to be used in the logging industry to destroy their own environment and eventually causing flooding to treeless areas.
It wasn’t until 1988 when Thailand suffered a disastrous flood and the worst in a century that the government realized exactly the harm that they were doing and on January 10, 1989 logging was banned. While undoubtedly a very wise choice as wild Asian elephants populations had greatly declined and deforestation caused the loss of lives and homes, the logging ban put about 20,000 captive Asian elephants and their mahouts out of work.
It was at this time that tourism started to boom in Thailand and mahouts realized they could earn a living through elephant tourism activities.
So Why Not Just Release Elephants Back to the Wild?
If only it were that simple. Something undoubtedly agreed upon by John Roberts and every single person we interacted with at GTAEF and Think Elephants International is that we’d all like nothing more than to see every elephant live out its days as a wild elephant of its own free will. But there simply isn’t room for all of the Asian elephants.
The biggest threat to the Asian elephant are the loss of their habitat and the continually growing human population in tropical Asia. According to the WWF, “about 20% of the world’s human population lives in or near the present range of the Asian elephant”. The natural habitat is dwindling and migratory routes are cut off because of human settlements. As a result, elephant populations are small and unable to mingle.
The Evolution of GTAEF
When John Roberts first started the Golden Triangle Asian Elephant Foundation, he bought an elephant from a mahout in order to rescue it. A month later, the mahout was back with another elephant. It was at that point that John realized he needed a much bigger plan. Rescuing a few elephants from begging on the streets would only be helping those few elephants.
Now GTAEF helps elephants and their mahouts by providing jobs for both, education for mahouts’ children, and even their wives have opportunities to earn income and help support the family and elephant. Because captive Asian elephants have never been domesticated and their DNA strands remain the same as their wild counterparts, the scientists at Think Elephants International are able to study elephant cognitive and social behaviors that would otherwise be near impossible through trying to observe wild Asian elephants.
GTAEF does not buy any elephants. They simply provide a home for both the elephant and the mahout family. The mahout is free to decide which activities his elephant will participate in and both the family and elephant are well cared for.
As a result of these forward thinking initiatives at GTAEF and the financial support of Anantara, important strides are being made in teaching mahouts positive reinforcement techniques, providing education so that children of mahouts can have other career opportunities, and in understanding elephant behaviors that can in turn help with conservation efforts.
About 95% of Thailand’s captive elephants (there are around 2000 total) are privately owned. They are quite valuable, estimated at around 2 million baht (about $60,000 US) per elephant and are quite expensive to care for. Most simply put, without work in elephant tourism mahouts would have no means to care for their elephants.
Circling back to the aforementioned video of baby elephants being tortured and that these tourism activities promote cruelty, well…it isn’t black and white. Clearly the elephant in the video is being tortured, but this doesn’t mean that all elephants are tortured. Think about how some people torture and beat dogs…and horses…and chickens…and probably camels. There are jackasses no matter where in the world you go. Thai people are intrinsically known for being kind and humane. And their elephants are simply too valuable to abuse.
Chains and the Bullhook
Unlike domesticated dogs, cats