African forest elephants face severe poaching pressure and habitat loss, with welfare implications for both living individuals and the ecosystems they maintain.
Forest elephant welfare encompasses both individual suffering from poaching and habitat loss and the broader ecological welfare of the forest ecosystems they maintain. Poaching deaths are often prolonged and painful, and the death of matriarchs disrupts multigenerational knowledge transmission in elephant family groups. Orphaned calves that survive poaching raids face acute stress and require human care that cannot fully substitute for maternal and family group relationships. The ecosystem welfare dimension is also significant - forest elephants as seed dispersers maintain biodiversity that supports millions of other species. Conservation investment in this species has cascading welfare benefits across the forest ecosystem.