Levels Of Illegal Killing Of Elephants In The Laikipia-samburu Mike Site. (2010)

A programme to monitor elephant mortality was agreed by the CITES parties in 1997. The MIKE (Monitoring of the Illegal Killing of Elephants) programme, was approved by CITES in 2000; and its current modus operandi follow Res. 10.10 (Rev. CoP14). It was set up to detect changes in levels of illegal killing of elephants. Kenya has been monitoring elephant mortality through the Kenya Wildlife Service of all elephant populations in the country since 1990, including the current Laikipia-Samburu MIKE site. The information is stored in a national elephant mortality database. A report summarizing all information from 1990 to 2002 was undertaken prior to the inception of MIKE, intended by Kenya as their own base line against which future change could be measured (Thouless et al. 2008).