Should the UK have a complete ban on selling Ivory products?
Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall, chef come wildlife campaigner, has been looking into the shocking trade in elephant and rhino tusks and horn, in a two part series concluding last night on BBC1.
He travelled to East and South Africa and the Far East interviewing many different people from anti poaching units and the largest owner of rhinos in the world, to rhino horn dealers in Vietnam. Since 2007 over 140,000 elephants have been killed for their ivory, which is about a third of the African population.
He also went to China to see their concerted efforts by the government to stamp out ivory trade and educate Chinese people not to purchase ivory products. Towards the end of the programme he interviewed Prince William, the Duke of Cambridge who is an ardent champion for rhino and elephant conservation. Prince William informed Hugh that one of the best ways to stop the poaching was to eradicate demand in the Far East.
In a Convention on the International Trade in Endangered Species (Cites) that met in early October, a landmark agreement was reached by 182 countries that “legal ivory markets within nations that contribute to poaching or illegal trade must be closed”.
The Conservatives in their 2015 manifesto pledged that they would stop all UK exports of ivory. The law currently states that ivory in the UK that dates prior to 1947 can be sold or exported. Hugh and the scientists demonstrated that DNA testing is not foolproof as some “pre 1947” ivory carvings were actually DNA dated to post 1947.
Hugh approached Andrea Leadstom, Secretary of State for the Environment, and asked why she did not ban all ivory sales. She said an important first step had been made but evaded the question.
Today more than 70 high profile campaigners including Virginia Mckenna, Martin Clunes, Joanna Lumley and wildlife artist David Shepherd are campaigning for the government to use funding from the Department for International Development to help local people stop elephant and rhino poaching.
Here is a link to a Government Petition to Shut down the domestic ivory market in the UK
What are your views? Should the UK immediately stop all sales and trade in pre 1947 ivory? Should we spend more UK money helping save elephant and rhino?
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We are all out to stop the needless slaughter of all Animals, whatever the species if not used for food and that should be the prime target of all organisations & governments in the world.
Scrapping and making it illegal to own old Ivory etc will never work and it will push the Trade Underground and put up the prices and make it more worthwhile for the poachers to keep doing it.
Look at the recent terrible crime in Paris where they shot and killed a White Rhino in the Paris Zoo.
The Poachers and the New Ivory Dealers are the people who should have a very heavy punishment and long Jail Sentences or Hard Labour might help.
I no longer collect Old Ivory Items as they are obviously a problem for People with a conscience, but let me ask, do you where Shoes and Clothes made of fine Leather?
Please think carefully about this subject.
The elephant in her area seem to be doing well because Rangers keep after poachers.
She seems to worry more for the Rhino.
It's sad to say but, the very poor will take the money from the ruthless cartels who in turn, play on the stupid beliefs people have on the medical beliefs of Rhino horn.
Yet this is just one celebrity chef who is seemingly coming good. Whilst I didn't see the programme I do know something of the back story.
In considering the suffering and mutilation of these creatures no one in an humane frame of mind may say this trade may continue. Yet the only way to stop it is at the source.
If Britain bans the sale of ivory other countries will take up the slack. No change.
There must be a concerted international effort to eradicate ivory poachers, by whatever means necessary, or else we will lose yet another species of animal. A most noble animal of as yet unplumbed depths.
For those who have ivory in their homes, you have blood on your hands! Perhaps at one or two removes, but blood sticks none the less. Burn it so it can't be sold on. Expunge the guilt.
In the latter part of a long and heated debate on SS before the referendum I said we should demand a clear out of all current politicians and at the very least the top third of the Civil Service. That view found favour with almost no one.
And now we have a former candidate for Prime Minister, currently in a fairly junior role, who cannot discern public opinion and act on it.
I rest my case.
I met a good few local councillors and they show Leadsom as an intellectual pigmy. Some of the UKIP councillors and the Independents are magnificent servants of the public.
Please, Wilf, with the deepest of respect for your mostly quite right opinions, let's not queer the pitch with a Leadsom. Let's hang on to what good there is.
If our politicians and leaders have scant personal morality then, most assuredly, that will translate directly into their political lives. Therefore ...
How may we expect anything other than gross corruption from a largely corrupt assembly?
There is a post above that which just bring a smile. I hope so. It is awaiting approval at the moment.
I've spent half of my working life on farms and almost all of it living in remote British areas. Watching the dawn at four a.m., the sunset just before going to bed. I'd bore you if I went on.
But, I say again, I agree with you completely.