Giraffes Placed on Extinction Watchlist

Scientists have classified the land mammal as “vulnerable” due to agriculture, illegal hunting, and habitat loss.


2,423 Likes

During a meeting last week in Mexico between members of the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN), scientists placed the giraffe on Red List of Threatened Species. The mammal is now labeled as “vulnerable” as the global population of giraffes has fallen by 40-percent, from up to 163,000 in 1985 to only 97,562 in 2015. “Illegal hunting, habitat loss, and changes through expanding agriculture and mining, increasing human-wildlife conflict, and civil unrest are all pushing the species towards extinction,” the IUCN stated. “Many species are slipping away before we can even describe them,” IUCN Director General Inger Andersen said. “This IUCN Red List update shows that the scale of the global extinction crisis may be even greater than we thought.” According to a separate report published by conservation organization World Wildlife Fund (WWF) this October, animal agriculture, hunting, and overfishing are responsible for the loss of biodiversity, which the WWF predicts will result in extinction of two thirds of the world’s wild animals by 2020.