保护组织推出类人猿保护计划（在线收听）

保护组织推出类人猿保护计划

A new action plan has been unveiled to protect Central Africa’s gorillas and chimpanzees. It outlines threats to the great apes across six countries.

目前公布了一项保护中非大猩猩和黑猩猩的新行动计划，计划列出了六个国家的猿类所面临的威胁。

The regional action plan is a joint effort by the International Union for Conservation of Nature, Wildlife Conservation Society, and World Wildlife Fund among others.

这个地区行动计划是国际自然保护联合会、野生生物保护学会和世界野生物基金会联合发起的。

Dr. Fiona Maisels, a conservation scientist for the Wildlife Conservation Society, said the plan aims to protect the large number of great apes not in protected areas.

菲奥娜·梅塞尔博士是野生生物保护学会的保护科学家，她说该计划的目的是保护那些不在保护区内的大量类人猿。

“The take home message is that most of the apes are not in the national parks. They are spread out throughout the whole of this region," she said. "We really need to concentrate on protecting them, not only in the parks, but in the areas where they’re much more vulnerable to hunting.”

“重点是大多数猿类都不在国家公园里，它们散布在这个地区的各处，我们确实需要关注保护它们，不仅是在公园里，还包括那些容易被捕猎的地区。”

Maisels said the chimpanzees are faring better than the gorillas in Central Africa. But both are threatened by hunting, habitat loss and disease.

梅塞尔博士说在中非，黑猩猩的处境比大猩猩好些，但两者都受到捕猎、栖息地丧失和疾病的威胁。

The nearly 80 percent of great apes outside protected zones, are in areas where private extractive industries operate.

有近80%的类人猿都在保护区之外，在私人采掘垦殖工业进行运营的地区。

“Most of the rest of the forest domain of Central Africa is under selective logging, which means that the forestry companies are not clear cutting. They don’t do what they do in Malaysia or Brazil, for example," she said. "They just take out a few trees per acre, which means that the forest afterwards is fine for great apes, and indeed, elephants to live in. The problem is the hunting.”

“中非剩下的大多数森林区域都面临选择性伐木，这意味着森林公司是并不在乱砍滥伐，比如他们在马来西亚和巴西就不一样。他们只是每英亩选出少数树木，这意味着森林还是适合类人猿和大象的，问题在于狩猎。”

Maisels said African nations need private industry’s help in saving the great apes.

梅塞尔说非洲国家在拯救类人猿问题上需要企业的帮助。

“So, logging companies need to put in place anti-poaching measures to make sure that important endangered wildlife species are not hunted,” she said.

“所以，砍伐公司需要实施反盗猎措施来确保重要的濒危野生物种不被狩猎。”

Maisels said, however, that hunting is important for many local inhabitants.

不过梅塞尔说，狩猎对很多当地居民来说很重要。

“People will hunt around villages in Africa to eat. That doesn’t pose a problem to the species that they normally eat, which are small antelopes that live in the forest and large rodents, you know, rather like large rats and things like that," she said. "But when commercial hunting takes hold much larger animals get caught, whether deliberately or by accident, and then those animals are sent to large urban markets.”

“人们在非洲村庄各处打猎寻找吃的，这对他们经常吃的物种来说并没有构成问题，他们吃的一般是生活在森林里的小羚羊和大型啮齿动物，比如大鼠之类的。但商业狩猎会捕捉更大的动物，无论是故意还是无意，这些动物就被送往大城市的市场上。”

The Wildlife Conservation Society scientist said the long-term survival of chimps and gorillas is put at risk by commercial hunting.

这位野生生物保护学会科学家说，黑猩猩和大猩猩的长远生存就这样遭到商业狩猎的威胁。

“It’s not a food security issue. It’s basically a conservation issue if a great ape gets caught in a snare or if a great ape gets shot," Maisels said. "Great apes, like elephants, are much less able to reproduce rapidly to reproduce the numbers that have been killed. And that’s why they’re both on endangered species lists. That’s why they’re both on nationally protected species lists,” she said.

“如果一头类人猿掉在陷阱里或被开枪击中，这不是个粮食安全问题，基本上是个保护问题，类人猿像大象一样，其繁殖速度不足以弥补被杀害的那些同类，因此它们都被列入濒危物种名单，都被列入国家保护物种名单。”

The Regional Action Plan for the Conservation of Western Lowland Gorillas and Central Chimpanzees also highlights another big threat – Ebola.

西部低地大猩猩和黑猩猩保育中心的地区行动计划也强调了另一个重大威胁—埃博拉。

“We lost thousands and thousands of great apes along the Gabon-Congo border about 10 years ago with a massive Ebola epidemic," Maisels said. "Nothing like as big as the one we’ve seen in West Africa. And it wiped out huge areas of gorillas and chimps in the forest before it got into the villages. The only reason we knew about it was because people started getting sick. And that’s because they were finding dead animals in the forest – picking them up – taking them home and eating them. And then of course it went through villages just it’s done in West Africa.”

“10年前沿加蓬和刚果边界有成千上万头类人猿死于大规模埃博拉疫情，其规模都不如我们在西非看到的那样打。这场疫情席卷了森林里大猩猩和黑猩猩栖息的大片区域，然后进入村庄。我们只是在人们开始患病后才知道这个疫情，因为人们在森林里找到死亡的动物，然后捡起来带回家食用，然后当然整个村庄都患病了，就像在西非那样。”

Maisels added that current Ebola vaccine research could lead to protection for humans and apes alike.

梅塞尔说，目前的埃博拉疫苗研究可以促进对人类和类人猿的保护。

“If a vaccine can be developed that can be transmitted from ape to ape, once a few apes in the forest have been vaccinated, that would effectively vaccinate the whole population." she said. "We’re a long way from that at the moment, but there are people who are trying to do that, which would, of course, not only protect great ape populations, but would eventually protect all the human populations who are working within their forests.”

“如果能开发出疫苗，就会在猿类之间进行传播，森林里少数猿类得到免疫，那么就会让整个猿群得到有效免疫。我们还远未实现这一点，但已经有人在努力开发，当然这不仅会保护类人猿群体，还将最终保护在森林里工作的人类群体。”

The action plan also calls for “improved legal frameworks and stiffer sanctions for poachers; coordinated use and protection of natural resources with a priority on conserving great ape populations; and conservation advocacy to bring about behavior change toward great apes.”

该行动计划还呼吁“改善法律框架并加强对盗猎者的惩治，协调使用和保护自然资源，重点在保护类人猿群体，以及进行宣传保护，对类人猿做出行为改变。”

The previous action plan was released in 2005 and is credited with slowing the decline in ape populations.

前一个行动计划是2005年公布的，因放缓猿群衰减而受到赞誉。