“Atlas Shrugged,” netsuke-based box figurine by Peter Calvesbert, is

“Atlas Shrugged,” netsuke-based box figurine by Peter Calvesbert, is

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“Atlas Shrugged,” netsuke-based box figurine by Peter Calvesbert, is part of the Harmony Kingdom collection distributed by Harmony Ball Co.
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Ivory Trade
ROLE IN ELEPHANT CONSERVATION
hile experts disagree on whether
international ivory
sales may benefit elephant conservation,
they agree that museums can help educate the public about this issue.
From wooly mammoths and the
Hindu god Ganesha to the Disney cartoon
“Dumbo” and a stuffed toy from a wildlife
conservation organization on your child’s
or grandchild’s bed, as long as humans
have been aware of elephants, we have
been awestruck by these gentle giants.
“There is hardly a continent on Earth
that hasn’t been fascinated with elephant
ivory,” says renowned author and journalist John Frederick Walker, who has spent
the last five years researching the history
of ivory for his forthcoming book, “Ivory”
(Atlantic Monthly Press, 2008). “Elephant
ivory is not only the most valuable organic substance in human history, it helped
shape that history by driving the exploration and exploitation of Africa and was
linked with the slave trade.”
Museums in the United States and
around the world hold evidence of this in
their collections – from elephant ivory
netsukes and beautiful pieces inlaid with
ivory to carved tusks to full specimens of
African and Asian elephants. Because the
Convention on International Trade in
Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and
Flora (CITES) banned international trade
in African and Asian elephant ivory in
1989 and museum stores don’t sell
banned ivory products, it may seem that
everything that can be done is being
done. But, is that really true, and can
museums and museum stores be part of
a bigger solution to help elephant conservation and reduce poaching?
Ivory sales approved
Recent headlines seem to send mixed
signals. In June 2007, CITES met in The
Hague, Netherlands, and announced at the
beginning of its conference that it
approved a one-time sale of 60 tons of elephant ivory from three African countries
to Japan. CITES approved Japan as the
buyer after determining that Japan had
established strong domestic trade control
systems to prevent illegal ivory from getting into the country and will not re-export
Words by Joyanna laughlin
FALL 2007
THE MUSEUM’S
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any ivory products. By the end of the consurvey of 15 U.S. cities, and in some cities,
ference, ministers from the African elehalf the items were illegally imported and
phant range countries — some of whom
bore the hallmarks of production in China,
went to CITES in favor of legal ivory sales
he told the Washington Post.
and some against — hammered
out a compromise that lets each of
four African countries have a onetime sale of their accumulated
ivory stocks on top of the 60 tons
already approved. After these sales
have concluded, the CITES conference agreed to a nine-year moratorium on any international trade in
ivory. Also at the conference, it
was announced that the online
auction house eBay agreed to ban
international trade of ivory on its
John Frederick Walker in Angola
Web sites after an International
Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW)
To sell or not to sell
survey found that nine out of 10 ivory
If there is so much illegal ivory being
items sold on eBay sites were probably illesold, why sell any legal ivory at all? Doesn’t
gal. And the United States now has more
a legal ivory sale increase poaching? Peter
worked ivory for sale than anywhere in the
Pueschel, wildlife trade program manager
world, except for Hong Kong. Esmond
at IFAW, thinks so. Pueschel believes any
Martin, Ph.D., author of a Care for the Wild
legal sale of ivory sends the wrong message
International report released at CITES,
to poachers and consumers that the ivory
found more than 23,000 ivory items in a
MUSEUM STORE
Unique Fossil, Mineral &
Gemstone Jewelry
44
trade is open again. “Every time the reopening of the ivory trade is discussed, we’ve
seen poaching increase in African countries,” Pueschel says. Why? “As soon as you
buy ivory from someone, there is
the incentive to have more ivory to
sell. The cheapest source is the black
market and that means poaching
elephants.”
And yet, there are many facets
to this complex issue. The legal, 60ton sale from Botswana (20 tons),
Namibia (10 tons) and South Africa
(30 tons) consists of ivory gathered
from elephants that have died from
natural causes or from problem animal control. Zimbabwe is the
fourth country included in the second sale agreement. None of these
sales can include seized ivory from poachers or illegal shipments or any ivory of
unknown origin, and the money from each
sale is to be used for elephant conservation
efforts within the selling countries.
“One of the reasons the CITES decision
allows a limited, tightly controlled trade
in ivory is to allow countries doing a good
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8/21/07
10:49 AM
job managing their elephant populations
to benefit by selling the ivory that accumulates and put the money to use for conservation,” Walker says. “And it’s the first
time African elephant range states
worked together and developed a regional
compromise to address two important
issues: continuing poaching, especially in
countries with wars, civil conflicts and
breakdowns in civil order; and the interests of more stable countries with wellmanaged elephant populations that want
to derive some conservation benefit for
their elephants from that management.”
Finding ways to support elephant conservation and discourage elephant poaching is only going to get more challenging
as populations expand and people need
more elephant habitat to grow food for
their families. “For people in the West
interested in elephant conservation, the
real challenge is to help African countries
No longer just
custodians of our history,
museums are becoming
active educators of
future generations.
balance their human needs with their
wildlife heritage and devise ways for
these to coexist,” Walker says.
Wars and ethnic tensions plague some
African countries, such as the Democratic
Republic of Congo, creating conditions for
poaching to flourish. Kenya, which lost 85
percent of its elephant population to poaching between 1970 and 1985, has approximately 30,000 elephants today, according to
Pueschel. And, while that population is now
well protected and growing, Kenya may not
be a safe haven for elephants indefinitely.
It’s becoming known for disturbing violence in the forms of gender and ethnicbased discrimination, human trafficking
and clan warfare spilling over from neighboring Somalia, says Erica Chenoweth,
Ph.D., a research fellow at Harvard specializing in terrorism and international security
issues, particularly democratization processes. “Quasi-political gangs and death
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squads exert authority over some Nairobi
neighborhoods, and al-Qaeda-affiliated terrorists are known to exist throughout the
country,” Chenoweth says.
What museums can do
Page 46
earrings on eBay, the poaching of elephants can increase in Africa.
Pueschel and Walker agree that one
way museums can educate their audiences
about elephant conservation is by having
exhibits on the ivory trade. Pueschel suggests that museums obtain ivory seized in
country to show ivory’s impact on human
history and elephant populations from the
Ice Age to the present day.
In addition, museum stores could sell
products based on ivory made from nonivory materials and items that benefit
bring
elephants (see sidebar).
As economic, environmental
and political pressures mount
worldwide, and elephants and
other wild creatures continue to
follow their ancient migratory
patterns that have nothing to do
with countries, borders, wars and
politics, it’s more important than
ever for us to care for our wildlife
heritage because our futures, and
the planet’s future, are intertwined – lest we all end up as
specimens in a museum with no
Late 19th / early 20th century ivory items manufactured by Pratt, Read
one left to visit it.
& Co., on display at the Deep River Historical Society in Deep River, CT.
While it may not be practical to
wild herds of elephants from
Africa to roam across America’s
dwindling open spaces, U.S.
museums can play an important
role in elephant conservation.
No longer just custodians of
our history, museums are becoming active educators of future generations. “We are thinking and
behaving more like an educational
institution and less like a cultural
attraction,” says Anne Conable,
director of museum experience at
the Buffalo Museum of Science in
Buffalo, NY.
And what better place than a museum
to educate people about the ivory trade:
the fact that it still exists, how it works, its
cultural, economic and environmental
exploitation throughout history, and why,
when someone in the United States buys
a cute pair of supposedly “pre ban” ivory
illegal shipments and display it with information about how buying ivory increases
poaching. “In the 21st century the ivory
trade belongs in the museums,” he says,
not in practice in modern life. Walker is
developing an exhibit based on his book
that would travel to museums around the
Joyanna Laughlin is an experienced
writer, editor and poet who specializes in
healthy lifestyles and sustainability topics
and has a passion for making a difference
in the world. She lives in Colorado with her
golden retriever, Rocket, and can be contacted
at [email protected].
MUSEUM STORE
4 Tips to Help Elephant Conservation
46
If your museum is considering hosting an exhibit on the ivory trade, or you want your store to support elephant
conservation efforts, here are some practical tips.
1. Don’t buy elephant ivory – even by mistake. The Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild
Fauna and Flora (CITES) (www.cites.org) lists current information regarding domestic and international ivory trade.
In addition, the Museum Store Association (MSA) Code of Ethics lists helpful guidelines on what to watch for
when buying products for your store in “Buy Responsibly: The Consumer Connection” and “Ethics Policies for
Endangered Natural Heritage” (www.museumdistrict.com/membership/EthicsCode.cfm).
2. Learn more about elephants. There are a number of organizations throughout the world working to save elephants,
including CITIES (www.cites.org), the International Fund for Animal Welfare (www.ifaw.org), the African Wildlife
Federation (www.awf.org) and Care for the Wild International (www.careforthewild.org).
3. Offer non-ivory carvings and gift items. Several companies, including The Harmony Ball Co. (www.harmonyball.com),
supply museum stores with beautiful, resin-based products that look like ivory — including netsukes, gift
boxes and figurines — and can be based on ivory in a museum’s collections. “We’ve always had very positive
experiences with museum stores,” says Lisa Yashon, general manager at Harmony Ball. “The buyers know
exactly what they want and they purchase smartly.” To create these custom products, Yashon says the museum supplies photography or illustrations from which to carve, and the process takes an average of six months
from concept to finished product.
4. Sell “sustainable” elephant products. Sustainable elephant products do exist. For example, Mr. Ellie Pooh Paper
(www.mrelliepooh.com) makes beautiful hand-crafted papers and other products from elephant dung (yes, elephant
poop) and is working with a paper-making factory in Sri Lanka to give Sri Lankans jobs and show local farmers (who
kill elephants because they destroy crops) that elephants can be a sustainable economic resource for the country.