Baby Sumatran Elephant. Xinhua/SIPA USA/PA Images. Press Association Images. All rights reserved.Few people on earth have as close a relationship to the forest elephant as Baka “Pygmies”. They classify them into more than fifteen types, depending on age, appearance, sex, temperament and magical status. Many Baka believe that when they die, their spirits travel deep into the forest and walk side by side with elephants, like shepherds tending their flocks. On their hunting and gathering trips, which sometimes take them over 150 kilometres through the forest, the Baka make frequent use of the mokongo (the paths cleared by elephants as they migrate).
These forests are often considered wilderness by conservationists, but they’re not: the Baka have depended on and managed them for centuries. By creating seasonal camps, they sustain a mosaic of different types of vegetation and have spread pockets of wild yams throughout the rainforest – one of the elephant’s favourite foods.
Because of the distances they travel and the time they spend there, they are undoubtedly the eyes and ears of their lands in the Congo Basin. “We know when and where the poachers are in the forest, but no one will listen to us,” one Baka man told me.
