Animal Abuse-For the love of money.

IVORY TRADE

 

The ivory trade is the primary reason that the elephant population world wide is diminishing at an alarming rate.

Other species killed for their ivory tusks are the hippopotamus, walrus, narwhal and mammoth.

Poachers move from place to place where the elephant population has not yet been obliterated, wiping it out wherever they go.

Despite an international ivory trade ban being in place, there has recently been a surge in this illegal and brutal practice.

Below: Poachers kill elephants using methods such as stoning them to death, using a poisoned dart which results in a slow and excruciatingly painful death for the animal, and by shooting them with machine guns. Poachers slaughter entire herds of elephants when they gather to drink at waterholes.

 

 

What Is Ivory Used For?

Poachers mercilessly kill elephants so they can sell their ivory tusks. Today, it is thought that most of the ivory is illegally smuggled to China and Thailand to make chop-sticks, jewellery, ornaments, hair accessories, and many other items.

In Asia, many people believe that products made with certain animal parts have medical and mystical powers. This is despite such medicinal powers having never been proven and actually having been dis-proven.

People will pay high prices for products they believe contain these powers.

Below: Various items made from ivory from elephants tusks

 

                
Just one tusk can be worth around £40,000 (UK),or $63,000 (US), once it is carved in to various items.

 

Below: A mother elephant holds her baby close, protecting it. Numerous baby elephants are left orphaned after their mothers are killed for their ivory tusks, which are worth around £80,000,or US $126,000 for a set of two, once they are made in to ivory items. If orphan baby elephants survive to grow tusks of their own, they too may well be killed by poachers, in one of a variety of painful, distressing and frightening ways.

 

                
Below: Around 35,000 elephants are slaughtered every year for their tusks, to supply the ivory trade. This is on the increase and nothing much is being done by countries to protect the elephants that live there. As a result, their existence as a species is endangered, due to the alarmingly high rate of continuous killings.
 

                

Below: Innocent elephants brutally killed, primarily for their ivory tusks. Part of the tusks are buried deep under the skin, so the poachers leave these beautiful animals terribly disfigured after hacking their heads apart in order to get all of the highly prized ivory.