Ivory trade
Introduction
The ivory trade is the commercial, often illegal trade in the ivory tusks of the hippopotamus, walrus, narwhal, mammoth, and most commonly, Asian and African elephants.
Ivory has been traded for hundreds of years by people in such regions as Greenland, Alaska, and Siberia. The trade, in more recent times, has led to endangerment of species, resulting in restrictions and bans.
The ivory trade is the commercial, often illegal trade in the ivory tusks of the hippopotamus, walrus, narwhal, mammoth, and most commonly, Asian and African elephants.
Ivory has been traded for hundreds of years by people in such regions as Greenland, Alaska, and Siberia. The trade, in more recent times, has led to endangerment of species, resulting in restrictions and bans.
Elephant ivory has been exported from Africa and Asia for centuries with records going back to the 14th century BC. Throughout the colonisation of Africa ivory was removed, often using slaves to carry the tusks, to be used for piano keys, billiard balls and other expressions of exotic wealth.
Ivory hunters were responsible for wiping out elephants in North Africa perhaps about 1,000 years ago, in much of South Africa in the 19th century and most of West Africa by the end of the 20th century. At the peak of the ivory trade, pre 20th century, during the colonisation of Africa, around 800 to 1,000 tonnes of ivory was sent to Europe alone. World wars and the subsequent economic depressions caused a lull in this luxury commodity, but increased prosperity in the early 1970s saw a resurgence. Japan, relieved from its exchange restrictions imposed after World War II, started to buy up raw (unworked) ivory. This started to put pressure on the forest elephants of Africa and Asia, both of which were used to supply the hard ivory preferred by the Japanese for the production of hankos, or name seals. Prior to this period, most name seals had been made from wood with an ivory tip, carved with the signature. But increased prosperity saw the formerly unseen solid ivory hankos in mass production. Softer ivory from East Africa and southern Africa was traded for souvenirs, jewellery and trinkets. By the 1980s, Japan consumed about 40% of the global trade; another 40% was consumed by Europe and North America, often worked in Hong Kong, which was the largest trade hub, with most of the rest remaining in Africa. China, yet to become the economic force of today, consumed small amounts of ivory to keep its skilled carvers in business.
African Elephant
1980s poaching and illegal trade
In 1979, the African elephant population was estimated to be around 1.3 million in 37 range states, but by 1989 only 600,000 remained. Although many ivory traders, with the support of some conservationists, repeatedly claimed that the problem was habitat loss, it became glaringly clear that the threat was primarily the international ivory trade.Throughout this decade, around 75,000 African elephants were killed for the ivory trade annually, worth around 1 billion dollars. About 80% of this was estimated to come from illegally killed elephants.
The international deliberations over the measures required to prevent the serious decline in elephant numbers almost always ignored the loss of human life in Africa, the fueling of corruption, the "currency" of ivory in buying arms, and the breakdown of law and order in areas where illegal ivory trade flourished. The debate usually rested on the numbers of elephants, estimates of poached elephants and official ivory statistics.
Solutions to the problem of poaching and illegal trade focused on trying to control international ivory movements through CITES (Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora).
CITES debate, attempted control and the 1989 ivory ban
Some CITES parties (member states), led by Zimbabwe, stated that wildlife had to have economic value attached to it to survive and that local communities needed to be involved. This was widely accepted in terms of non-lethal use of wildlife but a debate raged over lethal use as in the case of the ivory trade. It was recognised that the "sustainable lethal use of wildlife" argument was in jeopardy if the ivory trade could not be controlled. In 1986 CITES introduced a new control system involving CITES paper permits, registration of huge ivory stockpiles and monitoring of legal ivory movements. These controls were supported by most CITES parties as well as the ivory trade and the established conservation movement represented by World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF), Traffic and the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN).
In 1986 and 1987 CITES registered 89.5 and 297 tonnes of ivory in Burundi and Singapore respectively. Burundi had one known live wild elephant and Singapore none. The stockpiles were recognised to have largely come from poached elephants. The CITES Secretariat was later admonished by the USA delegate for redefining the term "registration" as "amnesty". The result of this was realised in undercover investigations by the Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA), a small under-funded NGO, when they met with traders in Hong Kong. Large parts of the stockpiles were owned by international criminals behind the poaching and illegal international trade. Well known Hong Kong-based traders such as Wang and Poon were beneficiaries of the amnesty, and elephant expert Iain Douglas-Hamilton commented on the Burundi amnesty that it "made at least two millionaires". EIA confirmed with their investigations that not only had these syndicates made enormous wealth, but they also possessed huge quantities of CITES permits with which they continued to smuggle new ivory, which if stopped by customs, they produced the paper permit. CITES had created a system which increased the value of ivory on the international market, rewarded international smugglers and gave them the ability to control the trade and continue smuggling new ivory.
Further failures of this "control" system were uncovered by the EIA when they gained undercover access and filmed ivory carving factories run by Hong Kong traders, including Poon, in the United Arab Emirates. They also collected official trade statistics, airway bills and further evidence in UAE, Singapore and Hong Kong. The UAE statistics showed that this country alone had imported over 200 tonnes of raw and simply prepared ivory in 1987/88. Almost half of this had come from Tanzania where they had a complete ban on ivory. It underlined that the ivory traders rewarded by CITES with the amnesties were running rings around the system.
To indicate how important the principle of "lethal use" of wildlife was to WWF and CITES, despite these public revelations by EIA, followed by media exposures and appeals from African countries and a range of well respected organisations around the world, WWF only came out in support of a ban in mid-1989 and even then attempted to water down decisions at the October 1989 meeting of CITES.
Tanzania, attempting to break down the ivory syndicates that it recognised were corrupting its society, proposed an Appendix One listing for the African Elephant (effectively a ban on international trade). Some southern African countries including South Africa and Zimbabwe were vehemently opposed. They claimed that their elephant populations were well managed and they wanted revenue from ivory sales to fund conservation. Although both countries were implicated as entrepots in illegal ivory from other African countries, WWF, with strong ties to both countries, found itself in a difficult position. It is well documented that publicly it opposed the trade but privately it tried to appease these southern African states.
At the October meeting of CITES after heated debates, the African elephant was put on Appendix One of CITES, and three months later in January 1990 when the decision was enacted, the international trade in ivory was banned.
It is widely accepted that the ivory ban worked. The poaching epidemic that had hit so much of the African elephants' range was greatly reduced. Ivory prices plummeted and ivory markets around the world closed, almost all of which were in Europe and the USA. It has been reported that it was not simply the act of the Appendix One listing and various national bans associated with it, but the enormous publicity surrounding the issue prior to the decision and afterwards, that created a widely accepted perception that the trade was harmful and now illegal. Richard Leakey stated that stockpiles remained unclaimed in Kenya and it became cheaper and easier for authorities to control the killing of elephants.
Southern African opposition to the ban
Throughout the debate which led to the 1990 ivory ban, a group of southern African countries supported Hong Kong and Japanese ivory traders to maintain trade. This was stated to be because these countries claimed to have well managed elephant populations and they needed the revenue from ivory sales to fund conservation. These countries were South Africa, Zimbabwe, Botswana, Namibia and Swaziland. They voted against the Appendix One listing and actively worked to reverse the decision.
The two countries leading the attempt to overturn the ban immediately after it was agreed were South Africa and Zimbabwe.
South Africa's claim that its elephants were well managed was not seriously challenged. However, its role in the illegal ivory trade and slaughter of elephants in neighbouring countries was exposed in numerous news articles of the time, as part of its policy of destabilisation of its neighbours. 95% of South Africa's elephants were found in Kruger National Park which was partly run by the South African Defence Force (SADF) which trained, supplied and equipped the rebel Mozambique army Renamo. Renamo was heavily implicated in large scale ivory poaching to finance its army.
Zimbabwe had embraced "sustainable" use policies of its wildlife, widely seen by some governments and the WWF as a pattern for future conservation. Conservationists and biologists hailed Zimbabwe's Campfire programme as a template for community empowerment in conservation. The failure to prevent the Appendix One listing through CITES came as a blow to this movement. However, Zimbabwe may have made the career of some biologists but it was not honest with its claims. Arguments that they needed the revenue from the ivory trade for conservation were untrue since ivory sales' revenue was returned to the central treasury. Its elephant census was accused of double counting elephants crossing its border with Botswana by building artificial water-holes. The ivory trade was also wildly out of control within its borders, with Zimbabwe National Army (ZNA) involvement in poaching in Gonarezhou National Park and other areas.Perhaps more sinister was the alleged murder of a string of whistle blowers, including Capt. Nleya who claimed the ZNA was involved in rhinoceros and elephant poaching in Mozambique. Found hanged at his army barracks near Hwange National Park, reported as suicide by the army, declared as murder by a magistrate, Nleya's widow was reportedly later threatened by anonymous telephone calls.
As with many international decisions, the debate over ivory trade pits some national interests against other national interests because of the international nature of the issue. To make it more complex it spans different disciplines which include biology, census techniques, economics, international trade dynamics, conflict resolution, criminology – all reported to CITES delegates representing over 170 countries. The decisions made within this agreement have often been highly political. Inevitably, it attracts misinformation, skulduggery and crime.
The southern African countries continue to attempt to sell ivory through legal systems. In an appeal to overcome national interests, a group of eminent elephant scientists responded with an open letter in 2002 which clearly explained the effects of the ivory trade on other countries. They stated that the proposals for renewed trade from southern Africa did not bare comparison with most of Africa because they were based on a South African model where 90% of the elephant population lived in a fenced National Park. They went on to describe South Africa's wealth and ability to enforce the law within these boundaries. By comparison, they made it clear that most elephants in Africa live in poorly protected and unfenced bush or forest. They finished their appeal by describing the poaching crisis of the 1980s, and emphasised that the decision to ban ivory was not made to punish southern African countries, but to save the elephants in the rest of the world.
Southern African countries have continued to push for international ivory trade. Led by Zimbabwe's President Mugabe, they have had some success through CITES. Mugabe himself has been accused of bartering tonnes of ivory for weapons with China, breaking his country's commitment to CITES.
African voices
The debate surrounding ivory trade has often been depicted as Africa vs. the West.
A novel Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad describes brutal ivory trade as wild wielding senseless of power for resource-hungry economic policies of Imperialists and describes situation in Congo between 1890 and 1910 as "the vilest scramble for loot that ever disfigured the history of human conscience".
In reality the southern Africans have always been in a minority within the African elephant range states. To reiterate this point, 19 African countries signed the "Accra Declaration" in 2006 calling for a total ivory trade ban, and 20 range states attended a meeting in Kenya calling for a 20 year moratorium in 2007.
Renewed sales
Using criteria that had been agreed upon at the 1989 CITES meeting, among much controversy and debate, in 1997 CITES parties agreed to allow the populations of African elephants in Botswana, Namibia and Zimbabwe to be "downlisted" to Appendix Two which would allow international trade in elephant parts. However the decision was accompanied by "registering" stockpiles within these countries and examining trade controls in any designated importing country. CITES once again was attempting to set up a control system.
49 tonnes of ivory was registered in these three countries, and Japan's assertion that it had sufficient controls in place was accepted by CITES and the ivory was sold to Japanese traders in 1997 as an "experiment".
In 2000, South Africa also "downlisted" its elephant population to CITES Appendix Two with a stated desire to sell its ivory stockpile. In the same year, CITES agreed to the establishment of two systems to inform its member states on the status of illegal killing and trade. The two systems, Monitoring the Illegal Killing of Elephants (MIKE) and Elephant Trade Information System (ETIS) have been highly criticised as a waste of money for not being able to prove or disprove any causality between ivory stockpile sales and poaching levels – perhaps the most significant reason for their establishment. They do pull together information on poaching and seizures as provided by member states, although not all states provide comprehensive data.
The effect of the sale of ivory to Japan in 2000 was hotly debated with Traffic, the organisation which compiled the ETIS and MIKE databases, claiming they could not determine any link. However, many of those on the ground claimed that the sale had changed the perception of ivory, and many poachers and traders believed they were back in business.
A seizure of over 6 tonnes of ivory in Singapore in 2002 provided a stark warning that poaching in Africa was not for only local markets, but that some of the ivory syndicates from the 1980s were operating again. 532 elephant tusks and over 40,000 blank ivory hankos (Japanese name seals) were seized, and the EIA carried out investigations which showed that this case had been preceded by 19 other suspected ivory shipments, four destined for China and the rest for Singapore, though often en route to Japan. The ivory originated in Zambia and was collected in Malawi before being containerised and shipped out of South Africa. Between March 1994 and May 1998, nine suspected shipments had been sent by the same company Sheng Luck from Malawi to Singapore. After this, they started to be dispatched to China. Analysis and cross-referencing revealed company names and company directors already known to the EIA from investigations in the 1980s – the Hong Kong criminal ivory syndicates were active again.
In 2002, another 60 tonnes of ivory from South Africa, Botswana and Namibia was approved for sale, and in 2006, Japan was approved as a destination for the ivory. Japan's ivory controls were seriously questioned with 25% of traders not even registered, voluntary rather than legal requirement of traders, and illegal shipments entering Japan. A report by the Japan Wildlife Conservation Society warned that the price of ivory jumped due to price fixing by a small number of manufacturers who controlled the bulk of the ivory – similar to the control of stocks when stockpiles were amnestied in the 1980s. Before the sale took place, in the wings China was seeking approval as an ivory destination country.
The rise of China and the modern poaching crisisTo many conservationists with knowledge of China and its failure to control trade in tiger parts, bear parts, rhinoceros horn and a range of endangered and vulnerable CITES listed species, it seemed unlikely that China would be given "buyer approved" status for ivory. This is because that status would be based on China's ability to regulate and control its trade. To demonstrate the lack of ivory controls in China, the EIA leaked an internal Chinese document showing how 121 tonnes of ivory from its own official stockpile, (equivalent to the tusks from 11,000 elephants), could not be accounted for, a Chinese official admitting "this suggests a large amount of illegal sale of the ivory stockpile has taken place."However, a CITES mission recommended that CITES approve China's request, and this was supported by WWF and Traffic. China gained its "approved" status at a meeting of the CITES Standing Committee on 15 July 2008.
China and Japan bought 108 tonnes of ivory in another "one-off" sale in November 2008 from Botswana, South Africa, Namibia and Zimbabwe. At the time the idea was that these legal ivory sales may depress the price, thereby removing poaching pressure, an idea supported by both Traffic and WWF.
China's increased involvement in infrastructure projects in Africa and the purchase of natural resources has alarmed many conservationists who fear the extraction of wildlife body parts is increasing. Since China was given "approved buyer" status by CITES, the smuggling of ivory seems to have increased alarmingly. Although, WWF and Traffic who supported the China sale, describe the increase in illegal ivory trade a possible "coincidence" others are less cautious. Chinese nationals working in Africa have been caught smuggling ivory in many African countries, with at least ten arrested at Kenyan airports in 2009. In many African countries domestic markets have grown, providing easy access to ivory, although the Asian ivory syndicates are most destructive buying and shipping tonnes at a time.[
Contrary to the advice of CITES that prices may be depressed, and those that supported the sale of stockpiles in 2008, the price of ivory in China has greatly increased. Some believe this may be due to deliberate price fixing by those who bought the stockpile, echoing the warnings from the Japan Wildlife Conservation Society on price-fixing after sales to Japan in 1997, and monopoly given to traders who bought stockpiles from Burundi and Singapore in the 1980s. It may also be due to the exploding number of Chinese able to purchase luxury goods.
Despite arguments prevailing on the ivory trade for the last thirty years through CITES, there is one fact that virtually all informed parties now agree upon: poaching of African elephants is now seriously on the increase.
Ivory hunters were responsible for wiping out elephants in North Africa perhaps about 1,000 years ago, in much of South Africa in the 19th century and most of West Africa by the end of the 20th century. At the peak of the ivory trade, pre 20th century, during the colonisation of Africa, around 800 to 1,000 tonnes of ivory was sent to Europe alone. World wars and the subsequent economic depressions caused a lull in this luxury commodity, but increased prosperity in the early 1970s saw a resurgence. Japan, relieved from its exchange restrictions imposed after World War II, started to buy up raw (unworked) ivory. This started to put pressure on the forest elephants of Africa and Asia, both of which were used to supply the hard ivory preferred by the Japanese for the production of hankos, or name seals. Prior to this period, most name seals had been made from wood with an ivory tip, carved with the signature. But increased prosperity saw the formerly unseen solid ivory hankos in mass production. Softer ivory from East Africa and southern Africa was traded for souvenirs, jewellery and trinkets. By the 1980s, Japan consumed about 40% of the global trade; another 40% was consumed by Europe and North America, often worked in Hong Kong, which was the largest trade hub, with most of the rest remaining in Africa. China, yet to become the economic force of today, consumed small amounts of ivory to keep its skilled carvers in business.
African Elephant
1980s poaching and illegal trade
In 1979, the African elephant population was estimated to be around 1.3 million in 37 range states, but by 1989 only 600,000 remained. Although many ivory traders, with the support of some conservationists, repeatedly claimed that the problem was habitat loss, it became glaringly clear that the threat was primarily the international ivory trade.Throughout this decade, around 75,000 African elephants were killed for the ivory trade annually, worth around 1 billion dollars. About 80% of this was estimated to come from illegally killed elephants.
The international deliberations over the measures required to prevent the serious decline in elephant numbers almost always ignored the loss of human life in Africa, the fueling of corruption, the "currency" of ivory in buying arms, and the breakdown of law and order in areas where illegal ivory trade flourished. The debate usually rested on the numbers of elephants, estimates of poached elephants and official ivory statistics.
Solutions to the problem of poaching and illegal trade focused on trying to control international ivory movements through CITES (Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora).
CITES debate, attempted control and the 1989 ivory ban
Some CITES parties (member states), led by Zimbabwe, stated that wildlife had to have economic value attached to it to survive and that local communities needed to be involved. This was widely accepted in terms of non-lethal use of wildlife but a debate raged over lethal use as in the case of the ivory trade. It was recognised that the "sustainable lethal use of wildlife" argument was in jeopardy if the ivory trade could not be controlled. In 1986 CITES introduced a new control system involving CITES paper permits, registration of huge ivory stockpiles and monitoring of legal ivory movements. These controls were supported by most CITES parties as well as the ivory trade and the established conservation movement represented by World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF), Traffic and the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN).
In 1986 and 1987 CITES registered 89.5 and 297 tonnes of ivory in Burundi and Singapore respectively. Burundi had one known live wild elephant and Singapore none. The stockpiles were recognised to have largely come from poached elephants. The CITES Secretariat was later admonished by the USA delegate for redefining the term "registration" as "amnesty". The result of this was realised in undercover investigations by the Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA), a small under-funded NGO, when they met with traders in Hong Kong. Large parts of the stockpiles were owned by international criminals behind the poaching and illegal international trade. Well known Hong Kong-based traders such as Wang and Poon were beneficiaries of the amnesty, and elephant expert Iain Douglas-Hamilton commented on the Burundi amnesty that it "made at least two millionaires". EIA confirmed with their investigations that not only had these syndicates made enormous wealth, but they also possessed huge quantities of CITES permits with which they continued to smuggle new ivory, which if stopped by customs, they produced the paper permit. CITES had created a system which increased the value of ivory on the international market, rewarded international smugglers and gave them the ability to control the trade and continue smuggling new ivory.
Further failures of this "control" system were uncovered by the EIA when they gained undercover access and filmed ivory carving factories run by Hong Kong traders, including Poon, in the United Arab Emirates. They also collected official trade statistics, airway bills and further evidence in UAE, Singapore and Hong Kong. The UAE statistics showed that this country alone had imported over 200 tonnes of raw and simply prepared ivory in 1987/88. Almost half of this had come from Tanzania where they had a complete ban on ivory. It underlined that the ivory traders rewarded by CITES with the amnesties were running rings around the system.
To indicate how important the principle of "lethal use" of wildlife was to WWF and CITES, despite these public revelations by EIA, followed by media exposures and appeals from African countries and a range of well respected organisations around the world, WWF only came out in support of a ban in mid-1989 and even then attempted to water down decisions at the October 1989 meeting of CITES.
Tanzania, attempting to break down the ivory syndicates that it recognised were corrupting its society, proposed an Appendix One listing for the African Elephant (effectively a ban on international trade). Some southern African countries including South Africa and Zimbabwe were vehemently opposed. They claimed that their elephant populations were well managed and they wanted revenue from ivory sales to fund conservation. Although both countries were implicated as entrepots in illegal ivory from other African countries, WWF, with strong ties to both countries, found itself in a difficult position. It is well documented that publicly it opposed the trade but privately it tried to appease these southern African states.
At the October meeting of CITES after heated debates, the African elephant was put on Appendix One of CITES, and three months later in January 1990 when the decision was enacted, the international trade in ivory was banned.
It is widely accepted that the ivory ban worked. The poaching epidemic that had hit so much of the African elephants' range was greatly reduced. Ivory prices plummeted and ivory markets around the world closed, almost all of which were in Europe and the USA. It has been reported that it was not simply the act of the Appendix One listing and various national bans associated with it, but the enormous publicity surrounding the issue prior to the decision and afterwards, that created a widely accepted perception that the trade was harmful and now illegal. Richard Leakey stated that stockpiles remained unclaimed in Kenya and it became cheaper and easier for authorities to control the killing of elephants.
Southern African opposition to the ban
Throughout the debate which led to the 1990 ivory ban, a group of southern African countries supported Hong Kong and Japanese ivory traders to maintain trade. This was stated to be because these countries claimed to have well managed elephant populations and they needed the revenue from ivory sales to fund conservation. These countries were South Africa, Zimbabwe, Botswana, Namibia and Swaziland. They voted against the Appendix One listing and actively worked to reverse the decision.
The two countries leading the attempt to overturn the ban immediately after it was agreed were South Africa and Zimbabwe.
South Africa's claim that its elephants were well managed was not seriously challenged. However, its role in the illegal ivory trade and slaughter of elephants in neighbouring countries was exposed in numerous news articles of the time, as part of its policy of destabilisation of its neighbours. 95% of South Africa's elephants were found in Kruger National Park which was partly run by the South African Defence Force (SADF) which trained, supplied and equipped the rebel Mozambique army Renamo. Renamo was heavily implicated in large scale ivory poaching to finance its army.
Zimbabwe had embraced "sustainable" use policies of its wildlife, widely seen by some governments and the WWF as a pattern for future conservation. Conservationists and biologists hailed Zimbabwe's Campfire programme as a template for community empowerment in conservation. The failure to prevent the Appendix One listing through CITES came as a blow to this movement. However, Zimbabwe may have made the career of some biologists but it was not honest with its claims. Arguments that they needed the revenue from the ivory trade for conservation were untrue since ivory sales' revenue was returned to the central treasury. Its elephant census was accused of double counting elephants crossing its border with Botswana by building artificial water-holes. The ivory trade was also wildly out of control within its borders, with Zimbabwe National Army (ZNA) involvement in poaching in Gonarezhou National Park and other areas.Perhaps more sinister was the alleged murder of a string of whistle blowers, including Capt. Nleya who claimed the ZNA was involved in rhinoceros and elephant poaching in Mozambique. Found hanged at his army barracks near Hwange National Park, reported as suicide by the army, declared as murder by a magistrate, Nleya's widow was reportedly later threatened by anonymous telephone calls.
As with many international decisions, the debate over ivory trade pits some national interests against other national interests because of the international nature of the issue. To make it more complex it spans different disciplines which include biology, census techniques, economics, international trade dynamics, conflict resolution, criminology – all reported to CITES delegates representing over 170 countries. The decisions made within this agreement have often been highly political. Inevitably, it attracts misinformation, skulduggery and crime.
The southern African countries continue to attempt to sell ivory through legal systems. In an appeal to overcome national interests, a group of eminent elephant scientists responded with an open letter in 2002 which clearly explained the effects of the ivory trade on other countries. They stated that the proposals for renewed trade from southern Africa did not bare comparison with most of Africa because they were based on a South African model where 90% of the elephant population lived in a fenced National Park. They went on to describe South Africa's wealth and ability to enforce the law within these boundaries. By comparison, they made it clear that most elephants in Africa live in poorly protected and unfenced bush or forest. They finished their appeal by describing the poaching crisis of the 1980s, and emphasised that the decision to ban ivory was not made to punish southern African countries, but to save the elephants in the rest of the world.
Southern African countries have continued to push for international ivory trade. Led by Zimbabwe's President Mugabe, they have had some success through CITES. Mugabe himself has been accused of bartering tonnes of ivory for weapons with China, breaking his country's commitment to CITES.
African voices
The debate surrounding ivory trade has often been depicted as Africa vs. the West.
A novel Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad describes brutal ivory trade as wild wielding senseless of power for resource-hungry economic policies of Imperialists and describes situation in Congo between 1890 and 1910 as "the vilest scramble for loot that ever disfigured the history of human conscience".
In reality the southern Africans have always been in a minority within the African elephant range states. To reiterate this point, 19 African countries signed the "Accra Declaration" in 2006 calling for a total ivory trade ban, and 20 range states attended a meeting in Kenya calling for a 20 year moratorium in 2007.
Renewed sales
Using criteria that had been agreed upon at the 1989 CITES meeting, among much controversy and debate, in 1997 CITES parties agreed to allow the populations of African elephants in Botswana, Namibia and Zimbabwe to be "downlisted" to Appendix Two which would allow international trade in elephant parts. However the decision was accompanied by "registering" stockpiles within these countries and examining trade controls in any designated importing country. CITES once again was attempting to set up a control system.
49 tonnes of ivory was registered in these three countries, and Japan's assertion that it had sufficient controls in place was accepted by CITES and the ivory was sold to Japanese traders in 1997 as an "experiment".
In 2000, South Africa also "downlisted" its elephant population to CITES Appendix Two with a stated desire to sell its ivory stockpile. In the same year, CITES agreed to the establishment of two systems to inform its member states on the status of illegal killing and trade. The two systems, Monitoring the Illegal Killing of Elephants (MIKE) and Elephant Trade Information System (ETIS) have been highly criticised as a waste of money for not being able to prove or disprove any causality between ivory stockpile sales and poaching levels – perhaps the most significant reason for their establishment. They do pull together information on poaching and seizures as provided by member states, although not all states provide comprehensive data.
The effect of the sale of ivory to Japan in 2000 was hotly debated with Traffic, the organisation which compiled the ETIS and MIKE databases, claiming they could not determine any link. However, many of those on the ground claimed that the sale had changed the perception of ivory, and many poachers and traders believed they were back in business.
A seizure of over 6 tonnes of ivory in Singapore in 2002 provided a stark warning that poaching in Africa was not for only local markets, but that some of the ivory syndicates from the 1980s were operating again. 532 elephant tusks and over 40,000 blank ivory hankos (Japanese name seals) were seized, and the EIA carried out investigations which showed that this case had been preceded by 19 other suspected ivory shipments, four destined for China and the rest for Singapore, though often en route to Japan. The ivory originated in Zambia and was collected in Malawi before being containerised and shipped out of South Africa. Between March 1994 and May 1998, nine suspected shipments had been sent by the same company Sheng Luck from Malawi to Singapore. After this, they started to be dispatched to China. Analysis and cross-referencing revealed company names and company directors already known to the EIA from investigations in the 1980s – the Hong Kong criminal ivory syndicates were active again.
In 2002, another 60 tonnes of ivory from South Africa, Botswana and Namibia was approved for sale, and in 2006, Japan was approved as a destination for the ivory. Japan's ivory controls were seriously questioned with 25% of traders not even registered, voluntary rather than legal requirement of traders, and illegal shipments entering Japan. A report by the Japan Wildlife Conservation Society warned that the price of ivory jumped due to price fixing by a small number of manufacturers who controlled the bulk of the ivory – similar to the control of stocks when stockpiles were amnestied in the 1980s. Before the sale took place, in the wings China was seeking approval as an ivory destination country.
The rise of China and the modern poaching crisisTo many conservationists with knowledge of China and its failure to control trade in tiger parts, bear parts, rhinoceros horn and a range of endangered and vulnerable CITES listed species, it seemed unlikely that China would be given "buyer approved" status for ivory. This is because that status would be based on China's ability to regulate and control its trade. To demonstrate the lack of ivory controls in China, the EIA leaked an internal Chinese document showing how 121 tonnes of ivory from its own official stockpile, (equivalent to the tusks from 11,000 elephants), could not be accounted for, a Chinese official admitting "this suggests a large amount of illegal sale of the ivory stockpile has taken place."However, a CITES mission recommended that CITES approve China's request, and this was supported by WWF and Traffic. China gained its "approved" status at a meeting of the CITES Standing Committee on 15 July 2008.
China and Japan bought 108 tonnes of ivory in another "one-off" sale in November 2008 from Botswana, South Africa, Namibia and Zimbabwe. At the time the idea was that these legal ivory sales may depress the price, thereby removing poaching pressure, an idea supported by both Traffic and WWF.
China's increased involvement in infrastructure projects in Africa and the purchase of natural resources has alarmed many conservationists who fear the extraction of wildlife body parts is increasing. Since China was given "approved buyer" status by CITES, the smuggling of ivory seems to have increased alarmingly. Although, WWF and Traffic who supported the China sale, describe the increase in illegal ivory trade a possible "coincidence" others are less cautious. Chinese nationals working in Africa have been caught smuggling ivory in many African countries, with at least ten arrested at Kenyan airports in 2009. In many African countries domestic markets have grown, providing easy access to ivory, although the Asian ivory syndicates are most destructive buying and shipping tonnes at a time.[
Contrary to the advice of CITES that prices may be depressed, and those that supported the sale of stockpiles in 2008, the price of ivory in China has greatly increased. Some believe this may be due to deliberate price fixing by those who bought the stockpile, echoing the warnings from the Japan Wildlife Conservation Society on price-fixing after sales to Japan in 1997, and monopoly given to traders who bought stockpiles from Burundi and Singapore in the 1980s. It may also be due to the exploding number of Chinese able to purchase luxury goods.
Despite arguments prevailing on the ivory trade for the last thirty years through CITES, there is one fact that virtually all informed parties now agree upon: poaching of African elephants is now seriously on the increase.
Asian Elephant
International trade in Asian elephant ivory was banned in 1975 when the Asian elephant was placed on Appendix One of the Convention on the International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES). By the late 1980s, it was believed that only around 50,000 remained in the wild.
There has been little controversy in the decision to ban trade in Asian elephant ivory. However, the species is still threatened by the ivory trade, and many conservationists have supported the African ivory trade ban because evidence shows that ivory traders are not concerned whether their raw material is from Africa or Asia. Decisions by CITES on ivory trade affect Asian elephants. For intricate carving, Asian ivory is often preferred.
Walrus ivory
Trade in walrus ivory has been conducted for hundreds of years in large regions of the northern hemisphere by such groups as the Norse, Europeans, the Inuit, Russians, the people of Greenland and Eskimos.
Source: Wikipedia
International trade in Asian elephant ivory was banned in 1975 when the Asian elephant was placed on Appendix One of the Convention on the International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES). By the late 1980s, it was believed that only around 50,000 remained in the wild.
There has been little controversy in the decision to ban trade in Asian elephant ivory. However, the species is still threatened by the ivory trade, and many conservationists have supported the African ivory trade ban because evidence shows that ivory traders are not concerned whether their raw material is from Africa or Asia. Decisions by CITES on ivory trade affect Asian elephants. For intricate carving, Asian ivory is often preferred.
Walrus ivory
Trade in walrus ivory has been conducted for hundreds of years in large regions of the northern hemisphere by such groups as the Norse, Europeans, the Inuit, Russians, the people of Greenland and Eskimos.
Source: Wikipedia
The process involved
in procuring ivory is horrific
The elephant must be killed before the ivory can be procured - stoning, poison dart resulting in slow painful death or machine gun slaughter of entire herds at waterholes.
Regardless of the mode in which the elephants are killed, the process of extracting the ivory is all the same. In order to obtain all the ivory from the elephant, the hunter and poacher must cut into the head because approximately 25% of the ivory is contained in the head. What is then left on the fields of the African or Asian plains is the corpse of a tusk less elephant with a mutilated face and head.
Illegal ivory trade flourishes in Thailand
2009 - The largest illegal ivory market in Asia – much of it poached from elephants in Africa – continues to thrive in Thailand, according to the latest market surveys by the wildlife trade monitoring network TRAFFIC.
The organization also raises concerns that legal provisions in Thailand governing trade in domesticated elephants are providing cover for illegal trade in wild-caught, highly-endangered Asian elephants from both Thailand and neighboring Myanmar.
TRAFFIC, a partnership of WWF and IUCN, oversees a global monitoring program, the Elephant Trade Information System (ETIS), for the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES).
CITES is an international agreement between governments that aims to ensure that international trade in specimens of wild animals and plants does not threaten their survival.
Thailand Signed Treaty Regulating Willdife Trade
Thailand is one of 175 countries that is party to the agreement.
But surveys documented more than 26,000 worked ivory products for sale in local Thailand markets, “with many more retail outlets dealing in ivory products than were observed during market surveys carried out in 2001,” the network TRAFFIC in a statement.
“Market surveys found 50 more retail outlets offering ivory items in Bangkok and Chiang Mai in 2008 than the previous year. However, overall there was less worked ivory openly on sale than in 2001,” the report noted.
“Thailand has consistently been identified as one of the world’s top five countries most heavily implicated in the illicit ivory trade, but shows little sign of addressing outstanding issues,” said Tom Milliken, of TRAFFIC.
“Thailand needs to reassess its policy for controlling its local ivory markets as currently it is not implementing international requirements to the ongoing detriment of both African and Asian Elephant populations,” Milliken said.
“Since 2004, the Thai government has only reported two ivory seizure cases totaling 1.2 tonnes of raw ivory.”
Bangkok is the Hub
Thailand’s capital, Bangkok, a major tourist destination, has emerged as the main hub for illegal ivory activities, accounting for over 70 percent of the retail outlets in Thailand offering ivory items for sale, TRAFFIC said.
The report includes new information on ivory workshops–eight in Uthai Thani, one each in Chai Nat and Payuha Kiri, and three in Bangkok–”between them employing dozens of carvers in the production of ivory jewelry, belt buckles and knife-handles.”
Much of the ivory being worked is illegally imported from Africa, TRAFFIC said.
“Some workshop owners boasted close ties with European knife makers, while others reported sending ivory, steel and silver items to the U.S. for sale in gun shops.”
“The Thai Government needs to crack down on this serious illegal activity and stop allowing people to abuse the law,” said Colman O’Criodain, WWF International’s analyst on wildlife trade issues.
“A good first step would be to put in place a comprehensive registration system for all ivory in trade and for live elephants.”
“Traders [are] buying wild-caught elephant calves for use in Bangkok as ‘beggars.’”
The study also uncovered reports of traders buying wild-caught elephant calves for use in Bangkok as “beggars” on the streets in major tourist centres, or selling them to elephant camps and entertainment parks, TRAFFIC said.
“Hundreds of live elephants are known to have been illegally imported from Myanmar in recent years, to be sold to elephant trekking companies catering to adventure tourism in Thailand.
“The capture of wild elephants has been banned in Thailand since the 1970s, but such trade usually goes undetected because domesticated elephants do not have to be registered legally until they are eight years of age.”
The study also found that over a quarter of all live elephant exports from Thailand between 1980 and 2005 could have been illegal due to incomplete and inaccurate declarations made on the documentation required under CITES.
“There must be greater scrutiny of the live elephant trade if enforcement efforts are to have any impact at all,” said Chris R. Shepherd, TRAFFIC Southeast Asia’s Acting Director.
“Thailand and Myanmar should work together, and with urgency, to address cross-border trade problems,” he added.
Source: National Geographic
The organization also raises concerns that legal provisions in Thailand governing trade in domesticated elephants are providing cover for illegal trade in wild-caught, highly-endangered Asian elephants from both Thailand and neighboring Myanmar.
TRAFFIC, a partnership of WWF and IUCN, oversees a global monitoring program, the Elephant Trade Information System (ETIS), for the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES).
CITES is an international agreement between governments that aims to ensure that international trade in specimens of wild animals and plants does not threaten their survival.
Thailand Signed Treaty Regulating Willdife Trade
Thailand is one of 175 countries that is party to the agreement.
But surveys documented more than 26,000 worked ivory products for sale in local Thailand markets, “with many more retail outlets dealing in ivory products than were observed during market surveys carried out in 2001,” the network TRAFFIC in a statement.
“Market surveys found 50 more retail outlets offering ivory items in Bangkok and Chiang Mai in 2008 than the previous year. However, overall there was less worked ivory openly on sale than in 2001,” the report noted.
“Thailand has consistently been identified as one of the world’s top five countries most heavily implicated in the illicit ivory trade, but shows little sign of addressing outstanding issues,” said Tom Milliken, of TRAFFIC.
“Thailand needs to reassess its policy for controlling its local ivory markets as currently it is not implementing international requirements to the ongoing detriment of both African and Asian Elephant populations,” Milliken said.
“Since 2004, the Thai government has only reported two ivory seizure cases totaling 1.2 tonnes of raw ivory.”
Bangkok is the Hub
Thailand’s capital, Bangkok, a major tourist destination, has emerged as the main hub for illegal ivory activities, accounting for over 70 percent of the retail outlets in Thailand offering ivory items for sale, TRAFFIC said.
The report includes new information on ivory workshops–eight in Uthai Thani, one each in Chai Nat and Payuha Kiri, and three in Bangkok–”between them employing dozens of carvers in the production of ivory jewelry, belt buckles and knife-handles.”
Much of the ivory being worked is illegally imported from Africa, TRAFFIC said.
“Some workshop owners boasted close ties with European knife makers, while others reported sending ivory, steel and silver items to the U.S. for sale in gun shops.”
“The Thai Government needs to crack down on this serious illegal activity and stop allowing people to abuse the law,” said Colman O’Criodain, WWF International’s analyst on wildlife trade issues.
“A good first step would be to put in place a comprehensive registration system for all ivory in trade and for live elephants.”
“Traders [are] buying wild-caught elephant calves for use in Bangkok as ‘beggars.’”
The study also uncovered reports of traders buying wild-caught elephant calves for use in Bangkok as “beggars” on the streets in major tourist centres, or selling them to elephant camps and entertainment parks, TRAFFIC said.
“Hundreds of live elephants are known to have been illegally imported from Myanmar in recent years, to be sold to elephant trekking companies catering to adventure tourism in Thailand.
“The capture of wild elephants has been banned in Thailand since the 1970s, but such trade usually goes undetected because domesticated elephants do not have to be registered legally until they are eight years of age.”
The study also found that over a quarter of all live elephant exports from Thailand between 1980 and 2005 could have been illegal due to incomplete and inaccurate declarations made on the documentation required under CITES.
“There must be greater scrutiny of the live elephant trade if enforcement efforts are to have any impact at all,” said Chris R. Shepherd, TRAFFIC Southeast Asia’s Acting Director.
“Thailand and Myanmar should work together, and with urgency, to address cross-border trade problems,” he added.
Source: National Geographic
Growing demand of ivory in China,
drives elephants at the brink of extinction!
“Unless poaching and the factors that promote it are reduced,
the future of Central Africa’s remaining elephants
remains under real and imminent threat.” - CITES Secretariat
The martyrdom of elephants: a sad tale of greed
March 2012 - A recent mass slaughter of about 450 elephants shows Cameroon's government is woefully unequipped to deal with poachers.
The year 2012 started dramatically for elephants in the central African country of Cameroon. According to the UN, 450 carcasses of these animals - a protected species - have been found in the Bouba N'Djida National Park, near Cameroon's northern border with Chad. The slaughter is especially worrisome given that, as of 2007, the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) estimated that only 1,000 to 5,000 elephants are still left in Cameroon.
The massacre is sad proof that in spite of serious efforts, poaching continues to damage Cameroon's biodiversity, endangering an animal so important in the collective imagination of a continent.
Cameroon's Ministry of Forestry and Wildlife, the government agency in charge of the country's anti-poaching policy, saw its budget slashed from $43m in 2011 to just $33m in 2012. The money dedicated specifically to anti-poaching action was only $2m in 2011 - an amount clearly insufficient for tackling the problem.
The Bouba N'Djida National Park, where the elephants were killed, comprises about 2,200 square kilometres, making it the biggest protected area in the country. Only five guards patrol its grounds, one of whom was killed in 2011. They receive a modest salary of $160 per month. In April 2011, it was announced that the US embassy donated $39,000 worth of equipment to the park, including motorcycles, bicycles, radios, digital cameras and truncheons.
Given that the poachers - who are described as Sudanese and Chadian horsemen - cross the border armed with Kalashnikovs, we can only note the helplessness of Cameroonian guards. Additionally, the country's poor governance and high levels of corruption don't help.
Growing demand for ivory exacerbates the problem. The Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) tries to regulate the international trade of wild animals, and to keep it at a level that does not threaten species' survival. But the desire for ivory has been increasing in Asia, specifically in China and Thailand, where demand is said to be the highest. Wealthy citizens are ready to pay any price to purchase a good said to have medical and mystical powers.
This high demand has driven up the price of ivory: today, one kilogram of ivory is worth between $1,000 and $1,500 in the Asian market, and each elephant tusk can weigh 10 kilograms. Doing the math, this means that the tusks of the 450 elephants killed could have sold for a minimum of $9m - several times the total annual budget of the Cameroonian anti-poaching fund.
So far, the Cameroonian government's only official reaction to the massacre has been to call for a consultation with neighbouring authorities in Chad. This would be an option to consider indeed: the Sudanese horsemen, as described by guards of affected national parks and other witnesses in the region, could be members of the Janjaweed militia, which was heavily involved in the Darfur conflict. (Interestingly, Chad's president, Idriss Déby, recently married the daughter of a Janjaweed leader). After having decimated the elephant population of Chad, the Janjaweed might have made an incursion onto Cameroonian soil to slaughter more of these pachyderms.
Cameroon does not have the ability to, on its own, fight against this trafficking. The answer has to involve the international community.
Ofrir Drorir, an Israeli citizen based in Cameroon, is the founder and director of the the Last Great Ape (LAGA), an anti-poaching organisation. He believes that the insufficiency of Cameroon's response is not due to a lack of funds, but rather a lack of political courage to enforce the law, by arresting and punishing poachers and traffickers. The struggle is not easy, he says, but needs the full co-operation of all the ministers concerned (mainly the justice, wildlife and defence ministers). But Cameroon's government has not decided to act yet - which has exasperated the EU's ambassador, who sent an official letter to Cameroon's Ministry of Forestry and Wildlife.
The International Fund for Animal Welfare estimates that there were 600 elephants left in Bouba N'Djida before the slaughter - meaning that only about 150 likely remain. Now, it is more necessary than ever that the international community adopt an outright prohibition of the ivory trade. Moreover, a multilateral African treaty protecting elephants must be signed.
Nevertheless, no treaty in the world will be efficient if Cameroonians, Kenyans, Tanzanians, and other Africans fail to realise that with the disappearance of elephants, the continent is losing a part of its soul. Will the name of the Ivory Coast's national football team, Les Éléphants, remain relevant? And will we be able to tell our children tales about the largest land animal on Earth if it disappears?
This article was originally published at Al Jazeera. The author, Julie Owono is a freelance Cameroonian journalist and international relations consultant based in Paris. She blogs at Global Voices and is the Africa Desk Cordinator at Internet Sans Frontières, a French NGO which promotes online freedom of expression.
The massacre is sad proof that in spite of serious efforts, poaching continues to damage Cameroon's biodiversity, endangering an animal so important in the collective imagination of a continent.
Cameroon's Ministry of Forestry and Wildlife, the government agency in charge of the country's anti-poaching policy, saw its budget slashed from $43m in 2011 to just $33m in 2012. The money dedicated specifically to anti-poaching action was only $2m in 2011 - an amount clearly insufficient for tackling the problem.
The Bouba N'Djida National Park, where the elephants were killed, comprises about 2,200 square kilometres, making it the biggest protected area in the country. Only five guards patrol its grounds, one of whom was killed in 2011. They receive a modest salary of $160 per month. In April 2011, it was announced that the US embassy donated $39,000 worth of equipment to the park, including motorcycles, bicycles, radios, digital cameras and truncheons.
Given that the poachers - who are described as Sudanese and Chadian horsemen - cross the border armed with Kalashnikovs, we can only note the helplessness of Cameroonian guards. Additionally, the country's poor governance and high levels of corruption don't help.
Growing demand for ivory exacerbates the problem. The Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) tries to regulate the international trade of wild animals, and to keep it at a level that does not threaten species' survival. But the desire for ivory has been increasing in Asia, specifically in China and Thailand, where demand is said to be the highest. Wealthy citizens are ready to pay any price to purchase a good said to have medical and mystical powers.
This high demand has driven up the price of ivory: today, one kilogram of ivory is worth between $1,000 and $1,500 in the Asian market, and each elephant tusk can weigh 10 kilograms. Doing the math, this means that the tusks of the 450 elephants killed could have sold for a minimum of $9m - several times the total annual budget of the Cameroonian anti-poaching fund.
So far, the Cameroonian government's only official reaction to the massacre has been to call for a consultation with neighbouring authorities in Chad. This would be an option to consider indeed: the Sudanese horsemen, as described by guards of affected national parks and other witnesses in the region, could be members of the Janjaweed militia, which was heavily involved in the Darfur conflict. (Interestingly, Chad's president, Idriss Déby, recently married the daughter of a Janjaweed leader). After having decimated the elephant population of Chad, the Janjaweed might have made an incursion onto Cameroonian soil to slaughter more of these pachyderms.
Cameroon does not have the ability to, on its own, fight against this trafficking. The answer has to involve the international community.
Ofrir Drorir, an Israeli citizen based in Cameroon, is the founder and director of the the Last Great Ape (LAGA), an anti-poaching organisation. He believes that the insufficiency of Cameroon's response is not due to a lack of funds, but rather a lack of political courage to enforce the law, by arresting and punishing poachers and traffickers. The struggle is not easy, he says, but needs the full co-operation of all the ministers concerned (mainly the justice, wildlife and defence ministers). But Cameroon's government has not decided to act yet - which has exasperated the EU's ambassador, who sent an official letter to Cameroon's Ministry of Forestry and Wildlife.
The International Fund for Animal Welfare estimates that there were 600 elephants left in Bouba N'Djida before the slaughter - meaning that only about 150 likely remain. Now, it is more necessary than ever that the international community adopt an outright prohibition of the ivory trade. Moreover, a multilateral African treaty protecting elephants must be signed.
Nevertheless, no treaty in the world will be efficient if Cameroonians, Kenyans, Tanzanians, and other Africans fail to realise that with the disappearance of elephants, the continent is losing a part of its soul. Will the name of the Ivory Coast's national football team, Les Éléphants, remain relevant? And will we be able to tell our children tales about the largest land animal on Earth if it disappears?
This article was originally published at Al Jazeera. The author, Julie Owono is a freelance Cameroonian journalist and international relations consultant based in Paris. She blogs at Global Voices and is the Africa Desk Cordinator at Internet Sans Frontières, a French NGO which promotes online freedom of expression.
United States
Illegal ivory bust shows growing appetite for elephant tusks
By Wired Science - July 12, 2012
The next time you browse cute little ivory objects in a jewelry shop, remember that they could be made from the tusks of elephants illegally killed by poachers and smuggled into the United States. Their death could have far-reaching consequences, perhaps even affecting the climate.
At a July 12 press conference in New York City, Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance announced the seizure of more than $2 million worth of illicit ivory items, one of the largest such seizures in state history. The ivory was mostly used to make small jewelry, animal statues and carved tusks, which were being sold at two shops in Manhattan.
On a table at the press conference, a few objects were on display. Though they represented only a small fraction of almost one ton of ivory obtained in the case, 25 elephants were killed to produce them, estimated John Robinson, executive Vice President of the Wildlife Conservation Society, who was present at the event.
According to Samuel Wasser, director for the Center of Conservation Biology at the University of Washington, ivory poaching is a problem that keeps getting worse. It’s estimated that 2011 was the worst year in elephant poaching since 1989, and Wasser warned that the death of elephants can have large and unpredictable consequences.
Wasser said elephants play an extremely important role in African ecologies. “By taking them out of the habitat, the habitat can be changed in a manner that can never be remedied,” he said.
For example, explained Wasser, elephants disperse tree seeds throughout Central Africa’s Congo rain forest, Earth’s second-largest forest. Like the Amazon, the Congo forest can be considered a vast, planetary lung, and elephants help keep it healthy.
The ongoing demise of elephants is “changing the forest structure throughout central Africa. In 50 years, it’s quite possible that it will change so dramatically that the climate throughout Africa, and perhaps the world, will be changed.”
The objects were being sold by two Midtown Manhattan shops, the New York Jewelry Mart and Raja Jewels. The owners, Johnson Jung-Chien Lu and Mukesh Gupta, both plead guilty to environmental crimes. They will forfeit all the ivory as well and pay fines of, respectively, $10,000 and $45,000 to the Wildlife Conservation Society.
Wasser, who works with national and international law enforcement agencies like Interpol to assess the origin of seized ivory, said the type of objects found in this case was particularly surprising. “I haven’t seen a seizure of this size coming to the U.S. that involves such tiny pieces,” he said.
Illicit ivory sold in the U.S. is typically used to make handles for guns or knives, said Wasser. He sees the seizure as a warning that a market for small objects exists in the U.S., and not just its usual destinations of Japan and China.
According to TRAFFIC, a wildlife trade monitoring organization, more than 24 tons of ivory was seized across the world in 2011.
Today’s case “really is incredibly significant” in terms of U.S. trade, said Crawford Allan, regional director of TRAFFIC North America. Allan sees the seizure as a sign that the U.S. is becoming a bigger player in the illegal ivory markets.
Both Allan and Wasser, as well as International Elephant Society executive directory Deb Olson, praised today’s seizure. They all warned, however, that it’s just a small step towards solving a big problem.
If elephants keep dying, “the impacts on the ecology are something that is going to be very, very difficult – if not impossible – to remedy,” Wasser said.
Images: Jewelry and trinkets made from poached elephant ivory and displayed at the press conference announcing the seizure of $2 million of illegal ivory. Pictures can be viewed here.
Saving elephants
by cutting the illegal ivory supply chain
The illegal ivory trade starts with the slaughter of elephants, continues with wildlife traffickers smuggling ivory across international borders and ends with the under-the-counter sale of carvings, signature stamps and trinkets, in marketplaces in Asia and online.
The International Fund for Animal Welfare is working to cut the supply chain at all its major touch points by training rangers in anti-poaching techniques, lobbying politicians to take action to block the sale of ivory, collaborating with customs and law enforcement authorities to arrest black-market sellers and reducing consumer demand through out the world, especially China, one of the largest consumers of wildlife products including ivory.
In mid-February, we learned that poachers from Sudan in Central Africa were slaughtering elephants by the hundreds in Cameroon’s Bouba Njida National Park. Yet, officials in the Cameroon government, who were aware of the poaching, were sitting on their hands.
n early March, Céline Sissler-Bienvenu and Julie Landry, from our French office, flew into Cameroon with a French TV crew to investigate and conduct an aerial survey. Céline and Julie also sat down with the Minister of Forests and Wildlife and his counterpart in Defence and urged them to act quickly. With IFAW’s focusing the world’s spotlight on them, the government was finally forced into action.
Three hundred soldiers, a helicopter and three ultra-light aircraft from the national army entered Bouba Ndjida to stop the massacre. The poachers may have fled the park. We don’t know for sure because of the park’s size.
Almost 300 elephant carcasses have been counted in the aerial survey. The numbers of dead elephants may be significantly higher. Villagers in the area reported that poachers claimed to have killed 650 elephants.
With the slaughter in Cameroon as a backdrop, last week, INTERPOL, with funding from IFAW, tackled the illegal trade of ivory and rhino horn with the largest-ever African wildlife crime operation in 14 countries in East, West and Southern Africa.
Code-named, Operation WORTHY, initial reports indicated this crackdown resulted in arrests of several dozen people and the recovery of more than 250 kg of raw ivory, lion and leopard pelts, python and crocodile skins and live birds. Illegal firearms and other contraband were also seized.
Operation WORTHY follows another IFAW-funded program, an INTERPOL-coordinated wildlife crime enforcement training program conducted in cooperation with Environment Canada. The training focused on multi-agency cooperation and the benefits of coordinating the law enforcement resources of several African countries.
Work on the front lines of illegal trade is essential to protecting wildlife, but IFAW understands we can never protect wildlife everywhere unless we reduce consumer demand for those products. IFAW’s Asia office has worked for years to reduce demand for wildlife products in China.
The International Fund for Animal Welfare is working to cut the supply chain at all its major touch points by training rangers in anti-poaching techniques, lobbying politicians to take action to block the sale of ivory, collaborating with customs and law enforcement authorities to arrest black-market sellers and reducing consumer demand through out the world, especially China, one of the largest consumers of wildlife products including ivory.
In mid-February, we learned that poachers from Sudan in Central Africa were slaughtering elephants by the hundreds in Cameroon’s Bouba Njida National Park. Yet, officials in the Cameroon government, who were aware of the poaching, were sitting on their hands.
n early March, Céline Sissler-Bienvenu and Julie Landry, from our French office, flew into Cameroon with a French TV crew to investigate and conduct an aerial survey. Céline and Julie also sat down with the Minister of Forests and Wildlife and his counterpart in Defence and urged them to act quickly. With IFAW’s focusing the world’s spotlight on them, the government was finally forced into action.
Three hundred soldiers, a helicopter and three ultra-light aircraft from the national army entered Bouba Ndjida to stop the massacre. The poachers may have fled the park. We don’t know for sure because of the park’s size.
Almost 300 elephant carcasses have been counted in the aerial survey. The numbers of dead elephants may be significantly higher. Villagers in the area reported that poachers claimed to have killed 650 elephants.
With the slaughter in Cameroon as a backdrop, last week, INTERPOL, with funding from IFAW, tackled the illegal trade of ivory and rhino horn with the largest-ever African wildlife crime operation in 14 countries in East, West and Southern Africa.
Code-named, Operation WORTHY, initial reports indicated this crackdown resulted in arrests of several dozen people and the recovery of more than 250 kg of raw ivory, lion and leopard pelts, python and crocodile skins and live birds. Illegal firearms and other contraband were also seized.
Operation WORTHY follows another IFAW-funded program, an INTERPOL-coordinated wildlife crime enforcement training program conducted in cooperation with Environment Canada. The training focused on multi-agency cooperation and the benefits of coordinating the law enforcement resources of several African countries.
Work on the front lines of illegal trade is essential to protecting wildlife, but IFAW understands we can never protect wildlife everywhere unless we reduce consumer demand for those products. IFAW’s Asia office has worked for years to reduce demand for wildlife products in China.
Recently, in an interview with National Public Radio, Grace Ge Gabriel, Director of IFAW Asia, pointed out that IFAW monitors found there were many suspected illegal ivory listings on Baidu.com, one of China’s largest search engines . I am glad to report to you that based on information supplied by IFAW, Baidu is investigating and removing postings of illegal wildlife products.
Baidu shut down 13 forums engaging in the illegal trade of ivory, tiger bone, rhino horn, sea tortoise shell, and other derivatives and in live animals. Baidu also wiped 11 forums clean of any discussion related to banned species. In all, Baidu deleted 34,685 postings and is working with IFAW to find other ways to combat illegal online wildlife trade.
China is one of the largest consumers of wildlife products and an IFAW study found that 70 percent of Chinese consumers did not know that elephants were killed for ivory. Some thought elephants may lose tusks like people lose teeth. In Chinese, “ivory” means “elephant tooth.”
IFAW’s “Mom, I got teeth” ad campaign explains that ivory products only come from dead elephants and encourages people to reject ivory products.
These adverts are just one aspect of our ivory demand reduction work in China, but they have been extremely effective. They have been displayed in subways, airports and other high traffic areas. And now, they are included in a curriculum on animal welfare education. In June 2011, they were used by Zhejiang Education Bureau in the Chinese language portion of the National College Entrance Exams, which in that province was taken by nearly 300,000 students this past June. Now, every one of those 300,000 exam takers in Zhejiang understands the connection between ivory trade and the killing of elephants. If the ads become adopted in the college exams across the country, we could reach more than 9 million high-school graduates each year.
Source