Ivory and the attitude of some people towards ivory has become a problem.
This latest UK initiative seems to have been generated by a couple of factors additional to the ever vocal Tree Huggers and so-called "Conservationists".
The UK is now the biggest exporter of legal ivory in the world, and there is ivory laundering activity that appears to be able to take advantage of the legal trade in ivory.
China has already taken action that will eventually see the public ivory market in China collapse.
Then there is the fact that in 2018 the UK will be hosting a very important conference on the illegal wildlife trade. If that conference were to take place in a country that still had a legal domestic trade in ivory, it might be seen by some as a somewhat embarrassing situation.
So, we have a proposal for a total ban on the trade in ivory.
As with all attempted total bans, this ban will only handicap those in the public market place, those who are compelled to abide by the written law.
When any ban is attempted on any thing for which there is still a demand, the result is absolutely foreseeable:- the sale of these banned commodities goes underground, demand increases, prices rise.
Total bans are evidence of total stupidity, stupidity which is perhaps the result of a deficiency of an understanding of history.
The answer to the ivory conundrum lays in effective management, not in ineffective rules and regulations.
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