Wildlife Officials Make Heartbreaking Announcement About Future of Giraffes

Officials with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) issued a heartbreaking update about the future of giraffes.

The service announced on Nov. 20 that certain giraffes will need additional protection under the United States’ Endangered Species Act. Under the proposal, West African, Kordofan and Nubian giraffes are to be listed as endangered while Reticulated, Masai, Angolan and South African will be classified as threatened. The latter group of giraffes falls under the 4(d) rule, which means the FWS will enact protective policies it deems “necessary and advisable to provide for the conservation of” the affected species.

Though Angolan and South African giraffes are threatened rather than endangered, they would still be treated as such because they look so similar to endangered giraffe species and are therefore hard to distinguish by authorities. The measure will provide a limited amount of money for conservation in addition to increased research efforts surrounding the conservation of giraffes and creating an awareness regarding their decline in numbers.

"This action supports giraffe conservation while ensuring the United States does not contribute further to their decline,” Martha Williams, director of the FWS, said.

Though there are roughly 117,000 giraffes around the world, the Giraffe Conservation Foundation reports that those numbers have dropped drastically since the 1980s. The total number of giraffes has decreased by 30 percent, while northern giraffes have seen a population decline of 77 percent. There are some West African countries in which giraffes are completely extinct. The decline in numbers is due to poaching, climate change, drought, and the urbanization of land.