Elephants and Teak

While it's been a favourite for buildings, art and furniture for thousands of years, the harvesting of teak wood is a complex and demanding process. Because the logs are heavy they will not float - this means they can't be logged in the American style by floating them down rivers. In addition, the regions in which they grow are usually hilly or even mountainous, so lorry transportation is very rare. So even today, elephants pull the logs through the jungle regions, just as they did a century ago and then stack the logs in piles.

Particularly in Thailand, logging companies used elephants in their teak industry, however, the teak forests were depleted and the land became arid and spoiled, Thailand had problems with major flooding caused by deforestation and the Thai government was forced to ban teak logging except in very small, protected areas. This was good for the environment but devastating for the Thai elephant. More than 4,000 elephants were suddenly 'unemployed' and their mahouts and their families almost destitute as their source of income dried up. Many of these elephants became circus performers but today, as the teak industry recovers the elephants are returning to their former profession, logger!

Elephant photograph by jurvetson, used under a creative commons attribution licence

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