Elephant Database
African Elephant Specialist Group

2007 Continental Totals for Africa

All Years for Africa:201620132007200219981995

2007 Summary Totals for Africa

Data Category Definite Probable Possible Speculative
Aerial or Ground Total Counts52,320000
Direct Sample Counts and Reliable Dung Counts416,70336,56636,5660
Other Dung Counts60146,1388,7880
Informed Guesses2,645038,9806,148
Other Guesses00044,216
Totals 2006472,26982,70484,33450,364

Interpretation of Changes in Estimates from Previous Report

Cause of Change Definite Probable Possible Speculative
Repeat Survey+53,417+5,897+7,763-617
New Population+4,125+857+3,602+1,480
Different Technique+10,663+24,031+2,693-7,048
Different Area+24,409-2,631-2,3000
New Guess-6,501-1,283-9,807-4,999
New Analysis-6,780-700-11,127-44,885
Population Lost00-63-171
Data Degraded-9,131-2,490-6,241+7,297
Totals+70,202+23,680-15,479-48,943

Area of Range Covered by Each Data Category (km²)

Data CategoryKnown RangePossible RangeTotal Range
Aerial or Ground Total Counts170,68212,334183,016
Direct Sample Counts and Reliable Dung Counts678,33536,939715,274
Other Dung Counts83,3282483,352
Informed Guesses172,37930,022202,400
Other Guesses411,597113,026524,623
Unassessed Range597,9091,029,2521,627,161
Totals2,114,2301,221,5973,335,827

Elephant Estimates

RegionDefiniteProbablePossibleSpeculativeRange Area (km²)% of Continental Range% of Range AssessedIQI1PFS2
Central Africa10,38348,93643,09834,129975,0792952 .221
Eastern Africa137,48529,04335,1243,543880,0632645 .362
Southern Africa297,71823,18624,7349,7531,305,1403953 .481
West Africa7,4877351,1292,939175,545566 .443
Totals472,26982,70484,33450,3643,335,82710051 .41

1IQI: Information Quality Index: This index quantifies overall data quality at the regional level based on the precision of estimates and the proportion of assessed elephant range (i.e. range for which estimates are available). The IQI ranges from zero (no reliable information) to one (perfect information).

2PFS: Priority for Future Surveys, ranked from 1 to 5 (highest to lowest). Based on the precision of estimates and the proportion of national range accounted for by the site in question, PFS is a measure of the importance and urgency for future population surveys. All areas of unassessed range have a priority of 1. See Introduction for details on how the PFS is derived.

***Note that totals for the Definite, Probable, and Possible categories are derived by pooling the variances of individual estimates, as described at http://www.elephantdatabase.org/reliability. As a result, totals do not necessarily match the simple sum of the entries within a given category.
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