Almost every one of the speakers at the FPS'Mammal Society Symposium on mammal conservation in February made the point, directly or implicitly, that as man continues to press ever greater demands on the earth's space and resources, other animals to survive will have either to be of use to him, adapt to live alongside him, or be preserved by him in small remnant populations. Dr Keith Eltringham, for example, suggested that one way to conserve the African elephant would be to domesticate it. Its only economic values today are as a tourist attraction and a source of ivory – the one undependable and the other destructive – while much of the land that elephants occupy is coveted by a burgeoning human population. In many places elephants only exist by courtesy of man, who, as he becomes hard-pressed, may only continue t o extend this courtesy if he gets an economic return.