
U.S.-China Deal to Ban Ivory Trade Is Good News for Elephants - adamnemecek
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/2015/09/150925-ivory-elephants-us-china-obama-xi-poaching/
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Steko
Worth mentioning: when Xi visited Tanzania not too long ago his entourage
smuggled a bunch of ivory out. So yeah I'm sure the orders to stop ivory
trading from the guys whose houses are full of illegal ivory will be taken
seriously.

[http://bigstory.ap.org/article/c0dca42fbd17481989ad8946fe9e0...](http://bigstory.ap.org/article/c0dca42fbd17481989ad8946fe9e0152/report-
africa-ivory-smuggled-china-state-visit)

~~~
Theodores
Also worth mentioning is that China is now the new market for seal pelts and
seal meat. In 2010 they decided to start that trade with Canada, a move that
contrasts with the most of the rest of the world where bans have been put in
place.

I suppose a case can be made for battering two week old seals to death with a
sharp blow to the head, not forgetting to slit the arteries in their flippers
before skinning them as we wouldn't want to be over-run with seals, would we?
However, I am amazed that a new market can be found for seal products in
China. I can't imagine 'braised baby seal on toast' would sell that well if
sold in Europe. I don't know if you would get that many 'likes' after
'Instagramming' such a dish, which seems to be the reason for eating deluxe
food these days.

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rdl
I'm curious how the alternative strategy would play out: farming rhinos and
elephants for their horns.

~~~
userbinator
Elephants take a _long_ time to mature, so this would be a really really long-
term plan, even ignoring the other problems such as where to find the space to
keep them, and what to do with the rest of the animal besides the tusks...

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elephant#Birthing_and_calves](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elephant#Birthing_and_calves)

 _Gestation in elephants typically lasts around two years with interbirth
intervals usually lasting four to five years._

 _Adulthood starts at about 18 years of age in both sexes.[127][128] Elephants
have long lifespans, reaching 60–70 years of age._

Producing synthetic ivory would probably be much cheaper and cost-effective
way to get the same material.

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throwaway2048
you dont have to kill elephants to harvest their tusks

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gambiting
Pachers kill elephants that had their tusks cut off already, to extract the
tiny last bit of ivory remaining in their skulls. That's why strategies of
cutting tusks off regular elephants and destroying them were unsuccessful - if
anything, they made poachers more aggressive, since now they had to kill more
elephants to get any amount of ivory at all.

~~~
L-four
The idea is that if elephants are owned. The owner would protect their
investment in order to profit from the elephant in the furture when the tusks
grow back.

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kelukelugames
I'm not optimistic. How can China enforce a ban? I can't imagine the
government caring enough to act. Give it a year or two before we celebrate.

~~~
adamnemecek
Their crackdown on sales of shark fins was relatively successful, it went down
by 70-80% IIRC.

~~~
mahranch
> it went down by 70-80% IIRC.

Not even close, demand dropped by 29% (source below). And the cause of the
drop was the demand itself declining rather than anything China did. Their
enforcement was minimal, the soup itself was just becoming less popular. It
was sort of like a fad. Kind of like the sushi fad in the late 90s in
California. If it was due to China's actions, you wouldn't have these sorts of
stories still: "Why Shark Finning Bans Aren't Keeping Sharks Off The Plate
(Yet)"
([http://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2015/03/03/390449252/why...](http://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2015/03/03/390449252/why-
shark-finning-bans-arent-keeping-sharks-off-the-plate-yet))

~~~
adamnemecek
WildAid reports 82%
[http://wildaid.org/sites/default/files/SharkReport_spread_fi...](http://wildaid.org/sites/default/files/SharkReport_spread_final_08.07.14.pdf)

I don't have access to the paper referenced in the article, therefore I can't
really comment.

The article also uses a lot of words such as 'should', 'may', 'could' so I'll
need something a bit stronger than that.

~~~
mahranch
Did you read your link? The numbers " _were self-reported by shark fin vendors
in the Guangzhou_ ". Hardly scientific and it's only from a single city in
China.

I'd trust NPR over that source. NPR claims that while shark fin soup sales
dropped slightly, harvest & hunting of sharks is still going strong.

Though, the real point here is that China isn't and won't do much about it.
Oh, they'll put laws on the books and make a big show of it as they do with
everything, but it's just talk for the most part. Enforcement of those laws is
another matter entirely. For example, their pollution and environmental
regulations rival that of the U.S. So why doesn't China mirror the U.S when it
comes to its environment? Because they don't enforce those laws. And when they
do, a small bribe to the inspection team is usually all it takes to get them
to turn around and take the day off.

~~~
adamnemecek
> Did you read your link? The numbers "were self-reported by shark fin vendors
> in the Guangzhou". Hardly scientific and it's only from a single city in
> China.

Did you read yours? I prefer a source that clearly states where the data comes
from. I don't have access to the paper the NPR article references and I
imagine that you don't either so we don't really know where the 29% number
comes from even.

Are you arguing against the bans or are you saying that they won't work. If
the first, your arguments are kind of unrelated. If the second, sure, they
might not work. It's worth giving it a shot.

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bickfordb
We could also reintroduce elephants to North America

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klagermkii
Great job guys, east and west meet to talk about an African issue without
involving Africa at all.

The US is all happy to try and push for their own beef exports from cattle
raised in relatively poor conditions, but when you have a commercial animal
product that is from Africa and could provide a much needed export, everyone
suddenly discovers their morals.

~~~
adamnemecek
> east and west meet to talk about an African issue without involving Africa
> at all.

Well at the current rate of poaching, elephants would be extinct in the next
10-20 years. And considering the corruption levels in many of these countries,
yes, it's the consumer markets that have to solve this.

> when you have a commercial animal product that is from Africa and could
> provide a much needed export,

It's not a 'commercial' product when the ivory comes from illegal sources.
Would you be for legalization of cocaine to help the South American economy?

> would provide a much needed export,

On the large scale of things, it would hardly make a difference for the living
standards.

~~~
klagermkii
> Well at the current rate of poaching, elephants would be extinct in the next
> 10-20 years. And considering the corruption levels in many of these
> countries, yes, it's consumer markets that have to get involved.

Or you could let African countries farm them and have loads of them, just like
you have loads of pigs and sheep and cattle and all the other commercially
farmed animals which somehow are ethically different.

Instead you create a "War on Drugs" situation, which not only is hugely
ineffective at solving the problem, it empowers the criminal organisations
within the country that grows the product. Replace Mexican cartels with
African poachers. Now not only are we unable to make money from the animals,
we're losing money having to pay for rangers, and at the end of it lose the
animals themselves to the inexorable attrition from the poachers (as in the
White Rhino).

Then everyone in the West has a fat tut-tut about what a shame it is for the
animal to go extinct, while refusing to accept farming as a less ethically
palatable but more effective means of preventing extinction, and we just move
onto the next animal.

> It's not a 'commercial' product when the ivory comes from illegal sources.

It is a commercial product because there's a market for it and people are
buying it. It may be illegal, but it's still being bought and sold. Not only
that but in the past we (South Africa) have been able to release limited
amounts of stockpiled ivory to be available for sale, but these kinds of
agreements work to make that impossible.

> On the large scale of things, it would hardly make a difference for the
> living standards.

Africa needs every bit it can get to help development and be able to become an
economic power with its own valuable and unique exports. Even if it just helps
a few thousand people and their families be independent and contributing to
Africa's growth, that matters, and dismissing it comes from a position of real
privilege.

~~~
hugh4
Obvious problems with elephant farming, as an industry:

1\. You need very large fences to keep elephants in.

2\. Elephants eat a lot.

3\. Elephants take about fifteen years to grow to full size.

4\. Elephants don't breed very often.

5\. You only get one pair of tusks per elephant.

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kalleboo
> 5\. You only get one pair of tusks per elephant.

Actually, tusks are continually growing, like our hair and nails. I've read
proposals to farm a "sustainable" amount of tusk (Google says they grow 15 cm
per year). The Chinese market isn't looking for huge tusks for display but
rather a powder to put in traditional remedies.

~~~
adamnemecek
> Chinese market isn't looking for huge tusks for display but rather a powder
> to put in traditional remedies.

It's both actually. I believe that it's actually mostly bought in the form of
carved ivory and to a lesser extent for powder for traditional remedies.

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sea2summit
China has little rule of law; I have zero confidence this will be enforceable,
but it's better than nothing.

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dghughes
No mention of getting ivory from Siberian bogs from Mammoths a grey area since
it's not from a living animal but it's a terrible loss in an archaeological
sense.

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PackageUpgrades
We might want to change what we call them, if we want them treated as
something other than "Ivory"

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laichzeit0
So I guess they're following the example of banning rhino horn trade. How's
that working out?

