Canada needs to sign on to ban importation of ivory
I would like to bring it to your attention that there are four countries in the world who are directly responsible for the poaching of elephants in Africa. Canada, Namibia, South Africa and Japan. In most cases the poaching leaves baby orphans, who, with luck will be located and brought to facilities who care for orphaned baby elephants and who are with their custodians 24 hours a day to help reduce the trauma of losing their mothers.
Canada refused to ban the importation of ivory giving the poachers carte blanche to continue their merciless slaughter of African elephants. Canada’s reason, which has been disproven by people like Jane Goodall, is that banning elephant ivory could affect the well-regulated Inuit trade in worked narwhal and walrus ivory, although no evidence has been cited to support this claim. (All information provided here can be found on Google). Canada has banned sales of ivory from elephants killed after 1990. However because ivory is difficult to date, illegally harvested supplies enter the Canadian market with little or no difficulty.
Articles have gone on to indicate that Canada permits the importation of elephant trophies. Between the years 2007 and 2016 Canada allowed the legal importation of more than 400 elephant skulls and 260 elephant feet, according to the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora, which tracks the movement of animals and animal parts.
I personally wrote to federal NDP representative for Cowichan-Malahat -Langford, Alistair MacGregor, who indicated that Canada’s present policy of importing ivory to support the Inuit trade in worked narwhal and walrus ivory will remain. Therefore Canada will continue to aid and abet in the wholesale slaughter of African elephants by poachers. To repeat, Canada refused to be a signatory to the outright banning of imported ivory.
Jerry Shulman
Cobble Hill