20 numbers to make you appreciate the extent of the world’s poaching problem

NAIROBI, Kenya — The British government is holding an international conference in London Wednesday and Thursday on the illegal wildlife trade, aimed at protecting endangered species and ending an illicit business that threatens security and the environment.

Among the worst affected species are Africa's elephants and rhinos, as their ivory and horns are trafficked to the markets of China and the Far East.

Here's what you need to know about the illegal wildlife trade, in numbers and pictures:

19 billion: the estimated dollar value of the global illegal wildlife trade (Source: International Fund for Animal Welfare, IFAW)

An illegal ivory stockpile is burned at the Tsavo National Park in Kenya. (Tony Karumba/AFP/Getty Images)

10 million: amount in dollars earmarked by the US government for training and supporting wildlife rangers in sub-Saharan Africa (Source: US government)

Kenyan poacher turned gamekeeper Kuyaso Lokoloi (2nd R), 25, patrols with his peers through part of a conservancy in Laikipia, approximately 250 kms north of the capital Nairobi, in search of poachers. (Tony Karumba/AFP/Getty Images)

420,000: minimum estimated African elephant population (Source: IUCN, International Union for Conservation of Nature)

(Roberto Schmidt/AFP/Getty Images)

230,000: amount in dollars a Chinese man was fined by a Kenyan court last month after being caught with an elephant tusk in his suitcase. Heavier fines are part of Kenya's new Wildlife Conservation and Management Act (Source: Daily Nation)

A raw piece of elephant ivory is exhibited in a Nairobi court during the trial of Tang Yong Jian. (Tony Karumba/AFP/Getty Images)

60,000: the dollar price per kilo of rhino horn (Source: CITES, the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora)

(Lam Yik Fei/Getty Images>

29,000: estimated number of remaining wild rhinos worldwide (Source: Save The Rhino)

A black dehorned rhinoceros is followed by a calf at the Bona Bona Game Reseve in South Africa. (Stephane de Sakutin/AFP/Getty Images)

20,000: number of African elephants poached in 2012 (Source: TRAFFIC, the wildlife trade monitoring network)

Yao Ming, Wild Aid Ambassador and China's retired NBA star, looks at the carcass of an elephant in Samburu, Kenya, while in the country to film a feature-length documentary called “The End of the Wild.” (Simon Maina/AFP/Getty Images)

3,200: number of remaining tigers in the wild (Source: TRAFFIC)

An endangered five-year old Sumatran tiger is placed in a transport cage in Banda Aceh on April 26, 2010 to be relocated to a safari park in Jakarta.

2,200: the dollar value of a single kilo of elephant ivory (Source: US Government)

Ivory ornaments during an event involving the public destruction of ivory ahead of the international conference on the illegal trade in wildlife. (Carl Court/AFP/Getty Images)

1,004: number of rhinos poached in South Africa last year, up from just 13 in 2007 (Source: TRAFFIC)

(AFP/Getty Images)

1,000: number of park rangers killed in 35 different countries over the last decade (Source: International Ranger Federation)

South African anti-poaching task team patrol in Kruger National Park. (AFP/Getty Images)

300: number of elephants killed in early 2012 when Janjaweed militias from Chad and Sudan raided Cameroon's Bouba N'Djida National Park (Source: CITES)

Elephant meat from animals killed by poachers being barbecued inside Bouba Ndjida National Park in northern Cameroon in February 2012. (AFP/Getty Images)

200: number of orphaned elephants hand-raised at an elephant orphanage in Nairobi (Source: David Sheldrick Wildlife Trust)

An attendant at the elephant orphanage feeds an eight-month old baby elephant. (Simon Maina/AFP/Getty Images)

100: estimated number of elephants killed every day of the year in Africa (Source: UK government)

An excavator removes the carcass of an elephant after it was killed by poachers at Kothalguri village in India. (AFP/Getty Images)

100: number of Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) fighters thought to be active in DR Congo's Garamba National Park hunting elephants for ivory to help fund the group's murderous activities (Source: Enough Project)

Lord's Resistance Army fighters in 2008 emerging from a thick bush on present-day South Sudan's border with the Democratic Republic of Congo (AFP/Getty Images)

50: number of years before elephants are locally extinct in some parts of Africa (Source: World Wildlife Fund)

An aerial picture shows the main herd of elephants in Zakouma National Park, 800 kms east of N'Djamena in Chad. 90 percent of the elephants of the park have been poached in the last decade. (Michael Lorentz/AFP/Getty Images)

46.5: tonnes of illegal ivory seized worldwide in 2011 (Source: TRAFFIC)

Seized ivory tusks on display at a Hong Kong Customs press conference on January 4, 2013. (Dale de la Rey/AFP/Getty Images)

6: number of tonnes of illegal ivory destroyed by Chinese authorities in the first such public ceremony last month (Source: BBC)

Piles of ivory wait to be crushed during a public event in China in January 2014. (AFP/Getty Images)

2: number of permitted raw ivory auctions held since an international ban in 1989 (Source: CITES).

A view of Windhoek, capital of Namibia, where a legal auction of seven tons of elephant tusks was held in 2008. (aj82/Flickr)

1: number of confidential whistle-blowing websites set-up to allow insiders to report on suspected wildlife crimes (Source: WildLeaks)

An American conservation student plays with a four-month-old black baby rhino at South Africa's Entabeni Safari Conservancy. Entabeni is one of the world's only dedicated orphanages for rhino calves whose parents were poached for their horns.(Stephane de Sakutin/AFP/Getty Images)