NEW YORK (August 11, 2017) – The Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) helped ring in World Elephant Day, occurring this Saturday, August 12, by ringing the stock market closing bell at Nasdaq MarketSite in Times Square.

WCS President and CEO Cristián Samper, joined by other colleagues with WCS, aimed to spread awareness of World Elephant Day and the thousands of elephants that are disappearing every year due the trade in illegal ivory. By some estimates, the number of elephants killed for their tusks reaches as high as 96 per day. WCS aims to help save elephants in the wild by safeguarding the remaining elephants where they live, disrupting the trafficking networks that move ivory around the world, and stemming the demand for ivory products.

Last week, WCS along with the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation and other partners helped crush nearly two tons of confiscated illegal ivory in Central Park to bring attention to the elephant crisis and law enforcement efforts cracking down on ivory trade.

 

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