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Robert Borsak: why I shoot elephants

February 25, 2015 - 4:23PM

Robert Borsak wit African elephant that he shot.
Like Glenn McGrath, I know first hand the lengths to which animal activists will go to attack and vilify anyone involved in anything the activists oppose.

Because I am proud to be a hunter and speak publicly about the fact, I have been subjected to threats ranging from anonymous letters to both my home and office offering to kill me or hoping that I catch some incurable disease, to having social media sites include rabid commentary about my hunting. I have even had photos of my house and car uploaded to websites with invitations to "comment" about me.

It has not been pleasant, but I refuse to be browbeaten by what is mostly ill-informed commentary on shooting by activists who are not interested in sensible debate about the issue.

Their mantra is that "they don't like shooting or hunting and so no-one else should either"! The last time I looked, Australia was still a democracy – I am happy to defend my actions, but they simply don't want to know.

Much of the criticism I have received relates to my hunting elephants in Africa. Again it is mostly based on a failure to understand that the culling of rogue, crop-raiding African elephants, is conducted under carefully managed Problem Animal Control programs and under CITES endorsed quotas throughout the world.

I posted an account of a trip to Africa on a hunting website about 10 years ago, where it sat without comment or controversy until it was pointed out, most likely by these same "animal activists" to the mainstream metropolitan media, which then decided to make it an issue.

At the time, I was chairman of the Game Council, which was a favourite target for the extreme Greens in Parliament and elsewhere. When I entered Parliament following the sudden death of former MLC Roy Smith, it served to further infuriate the "activists" and they have carried on a vilification campaign against me ever since. I have no doubt they will ramp up their protests in the next four weeks in the lead up to the State Election.

But let me make a few points for their benefit, not that they want to absorb them.

Elephants are not an endangered species in southern Africa. There are about 90,000 in Zimbabwe alone, where they compete with subsistence farmers, who survive on an annual income of less than $100 a year.

Zimbabwe is an impoverished country, about half the size of NSW, and most villagers rely on subsistence crops of maize, cotton, melons, sorghum and in some cases, bananas. You can imagine what damage problem elephants can cause to these crops.

Elephants also kill many rural Zimbabweans each year. They go into the crops, generally at night, and while the villagers try to keep guard, beating pots and pans in an effort to drive them away, their efforts mostly fail. Indeed if they enrage the animals, they are often trampled.

It was because of these problems that the authorities in Zimbabwe developed the local Communal Areas Management Program for Indigenous Resources (CAMPFIRES ) program.

This program charges international hunters a fee to humanely shoot elephants that are destroying the crops, and then uses the meat and hides of the beasts to fund local projects. It also supports schools, health clinics, drought relief and anti-ivory poaching initiatives in the depressed rural provinces in Zimbabwe.

If one puts dollar figures to the immediate benefits to the local people from these safaris, US$2550 cash per elephant goes directly to the local village, plus the benefit of the elephant meat. The local outfitter benefits by over US$5000 to employ up to a dozen local villagers for each expedition, and the balance would end up in a community pool, licence fees are separate and go to the Game Department.

What disappoints me most is that many people have simply attacked me – as they have attacked Glenn McGrath – because they don't like hunting or shooting. That is their right just as much as it is for me to be a shooter or a hunter.

Robert Borsak represents the Shooters and Fishers Party in the NSW Legislative Council.

http://www.smh.com.au/comment/robert-borsak-why-i-shoot-elephants-20150225-13o9lf.html

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John aka NitroX

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Govt get out of our lives NOW!
"I love the smell of cordite in the morning."
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