Representatives from more than 150 nations are meeting this week in West Virginia to consider changes to a U.N. treaty protecting endangered species. One hot topic is likely to be the fate of sturgeon, whose populations have fallen between 50 and 70 percent over the last century, in part because of a black market in caviar. Officials who administer the treaty — the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species — say that a decision by delegates to curb caviar exports could eventually lead to a worldwide caviar ban. In other endangered species news, Asian elephants are increasingly at risk from ivory poaching as well as development, the World Wildlife Fund said yesterday. WWF’s Elizabeth Kemf said, “Of the 35,000 to 50,000 Asian elephants that cling to survival, most of these are being squeezed into increasingly smaller woodland areas.”
