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By Staff Writers, teleSUR
teleSUR
Saturday, May 30, 2015
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| Government officials place ivory tusks and products on a conveyor belt to a crusher at a confiscated ivory destruction ceremony in Beijing. | Photo: Reuters
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Conservation groups say China's pledge to stamp out its ivory market is a game changer in the battle to save African elephants.
China announced Friday it would phase out its domestic market for ivory, after authorities in Beijing pulverized 662 kilograms of tusks.
“We will strictly control ivory processing and trade until the commercial processing and sale of ivory and its products are eventually halted,” said Zhao Shucong, head of China’s State Forestry Administration, according to Hong Kong's South China Morning Post.
The comments were made during the highly publicized destruction of ivory products ranging from engraved tusks to luxury chopsticks. According to the Hong Kong-based newspaper, “the machine gave off a loud crunching noise” as it crushed thousands of dollars worth of ivory products.
China is the world's largest importer of elephant tusks, many of which are harvested in Africa by poachers. Conservationists estimate as many as 22,000 elephants are killed each year for their tusks, and the value of the global ivory trade is estimated in the hundreds of millions of dollars. Ivory is highly valued by wealthy and middle class Chinese as a status symbol, though in recent months the government has begun to crack down on the trade.
In January the government imposed a temporary import ban on ivory. In the same month, authorities carried out their first public destruction of ivory products, while pledging to take greater action to stamp out the trade.
Yet the latest announcement to totally phase out the domestic ivory market is a historic move, according to conservationists.
“The decision to phase out China’s ivory market as well as today’s destruction of the confiscated ivory are powerful indications of the government’s commitment to support international action against elephant poaching and the illegal ivory trade,” said Zhou Fei, head of the China office of TRAFFIC, a global wildlife trade monitoring group.
The World Wildlife Fund's head in China, Lo Sze Ping, said the government's decision “will have a profound impact on wild elephant conservation and ivory trafficking.”
“This is a very positive signal, and WWF applauds the Chinese government’s determination to conserve wildlife and combat the illegal trade in wildlife and wildlife products, including ivory,” he said. In a statement, WWF's Senior Vice President of Wildlife Conservation Ginette Hemley said China still needs to lay out a “firm plan and timeline,” but added that the United States now needs to join Beijing in taking a stand against ivory.
“The U.S. continues to drag its feet on enacting long-overdue regulations to better control its own sizeable ivory market,” she said. “These and other major ivory consuming countries hold the key to saving Africa’s elephants. We therefore urge the strongest possible measures from these governments to prevent an unthinkable ending for one of the planet’s most iconic species,” Hemley stated.
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