IFAW calls for ivory ban on Ebay.

07/12/2006 00:00:00

May 2007. An investigative report released today by the International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW) claims that the rampant trade in elephant ivory being carried out across eBay’s global network of auction sites is enabling consumers to literally bid for the extinction of the world’s largest land mammal.

According to IFAW, the snapshot survey conducted in the UK, Australia, China, Germany, the Netherlands, France, Canada and the USA*, tracked over 2,200 elephant ivory items listed on eBay websites and found that more than 90% of the listings breached even eBay’s own respective national wildlife policies. In the UK, 424 listings were investigated of which only 10 were found to be fully compliant with eBay policy, which reflects international and national legislation designed to protect elephants from commercial exploitation.

While international wildlife trade laws are complex, in general it is illegal to sell carved or uncarved ivory unless it is antique and accompanied by a proof of age certificate.**

IFAW claims that on eBay, however, many sellers are being allowed simply to list items with no provenance of legality whatsoever, in blatant contravention of the rules on most eBay websites. Worse, eBay’s enforcement of their largely vague and variable listing rules appears to be haphazard and hopelessly overstrained. Very few of the suspected illegal items reported by IFAW investigators to eBay during the snapshot survey were removed from sale.***

IFAW believes that the only way to protect elephants from poachers is to shut down the markets where illegal ivory can easily be passed off as ‘antique’.

Ebay should ban ivory sales
Robbie Marsland, IFAW UK Director says: ‘IFAW believes that as the world’s largest online shop window, eBay has a special responsibility to lead the way by banning ivory from their sites. Only a global ban on all ivory sales will remove the cover under which this criminal activity currently operates and as a result, seriously help to decrease illegal trade and the cruel and unnecessary slaughter of elephants.’

Last week IFAW met with eBay global headquarters to present the findings of ‘Bidding for Extinction’ and welcomed assurances that a review of wildlife policies will take place over the coming weeks.

Marsland comments: ‘Unless a market site owner undertakes every effort to eliminate this devastating wildlife trade, it must plead guilty to facilitating this dirty business knowingly. While eBay has taken positive steps over the last years, these have not brought the desired results. We are now waiting to hear whether they will ban the trade in all ivory on all their sites, which is the simplest and most effective way of ensuring they play no part in this grotesque and illegal trade. Elephants are facing extinction, in part because of Internet ivory trade. It is time for action.’

Previous investigation:
In 2005 IFAW published a report, Caught In The Web: Wildlife Trade On The Internet, revealing the findings of an intensive investigation into the online trade in wildlife. The study found more than 9,000 wild animals and animal products for sale in just one week, a figure all the more alarming since the survey was conducted solely from the UK and restricted to trade in just five categories of endangered species: live primates, elephant products, turtle and tortoiseshell products, other reptile products and those from wild cats.