6 Businessmen Caught Smuggling 11 Tons of Ivory
The men were charged under 11 counts of conspiracy, unlawful hunting, exporting concealed and undeclared items as well as making false documents. It’s likely that the intricate smuggling job was conducted between October 2008 and March this year.
Together the six men run several export and cargo clearing firms in Dar es Salaam as a front for the illegal smuggling operation. The tusks were discovered and impounded by authorities at their destination in the Philippines and Vietnam in cooperation with the international policing organization Interpol.
The trade of ivory has been banned worldwide under CITES (Convention for International Trade in Endangered Species) since 1989, after widespread poaching caused a rapid decline in elephant numbers around the world throughout the 1980’s. Though tragically, illegal trading and poaching is still commonplace throughout many parts of Africa. For instance, in 2006 a horrifying elephant slaughter near Zakouma National Park in Chad was just one in a series of massacres over the last four decades which has decimated 96% of Chad’s elephant population.
Elephants aren’t the only animals endangered due to the illegal trade in ivory. Ivory is also what constitutes the teeth and tusks of animals like the hippopotamus, walrus and narwhal. Nations in the Far East, including China and Japan, remain the worst consumers of illegal ivory. Shady practices continue to fuel trade and enterprise within their borders. For example, the Chinese government in 2003 acknowledged that it had lost track of 121 tons of ivory between 1991 and 2002.
The problem is even more tragic due to the fact that ivory is entirely unneeded, as there are numerous natural replacements for the material which don’t put endangered species at risk. One popular option is a species of hard nut called tagua, which comes from the ivory nut palm and originates in the rainforests of the Northwestern Amazon Basin.
The six businessmen detained in Tanzania for this egregious offense will be remanded in custody pending bail application until July 28th. Hopefully the courts there will make an example of them.
By Bryan Nelson | ecoworldly
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