By Chinanews.com

PLEASE SIGN AND SHARE PETITION AGAINST IVORY POACHING: http://www.thepetitionsite.com/takeaction/774/846/056/

Elephant tusks are highly sought after for use in Chinese sculpture, name seals andjewelry, and according to a survey conducted by the Convention on International Tradein Endangered Species (CITES), rising demand in China’s black market has becomethe most powerful drive for the illegal international ivory trade.

This year China surpassed Japan as the top consumer market for illegal ivory productsin the world, and over half of the country’s enterprises engaged in the processing andsales of certified elephant tusks have their fingers in the pie, reported SouthernWeekend.

Since 2008, when China was approved as a buyer of government-owned ivory fromSouth Africa, Botswana, Namibia and Zimbabwe, ivory laundering has become an openindustry secret.

Ivory laundering

The Elephant Trade Monitoring System (ETIS), which tracks global ivory and elephantproduct confiscations for CITES, shows a trend in the illegal trade of ivory that hasbeen growing since 1998 as a direct result of emerging demand in China.

An insider revealed that 100 kilograms of elephant tusks is only enough for two monthsof work by two skilled ivory carvers, so it is easy to calculate the general amount of rawelephant tusks that a factory uses by its number of carvers.

Theoretically, the legal amount of elephant tusks is only 62 tons till 2017, but in thepast seven years the number of ivory carving factories has increased from 9 to 36, andivory product sales offices have grown from 31 to 137.

So where do the other tusks come from? The answer is smuggling, mostly from Africa.Moreover, in the local unregulated ivory market, the majority of the buyers areforeigners.

According to the Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA), the year 2009 saw a recordnumber of seizures of illegal ivory being smuggled into East Asia, a trend that hascontinued over the past two years.

When some of it enters China, it usually has to be laundered. The process is simple: each certificate for legal ivory product is printed with a picture and a number, but doesnot contain information about its weight, which creates a loophole.

Suppose an enterprise only has 50 kilograms of legal elephant tusks for the year,which can be used to make 10 large ivory products and some small ones. The company may still make the same number of ivory products, but will mix in illegallysourced elephant tusks. In this way, the illegal sources become laundered and”certified.”

This approach has been condemned by many officials and animal activists who say itwill lead to further increases in demand, which results in the poaching of thousands ofelephants each year. In their opinion, a complete ban is the only way to the stop killingof innocent wildlife and end the deadly ivory trade for good.

Source: http://english.peopledaily.com.cn/102774/7675836.html