Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what account the Government has taken of the number of elephants killed for their ivory since 2010 in assessing the effectiveness of its ban on sales of ivory dating from 1947 to the present day.

Africa’s elephant population has seen the worst declines in 25 years, mainly due to poaching, with a reported decline of around 111,000 over the past decade. The UK’s proposed ban on trade in modern day, post-1947 ivory announced by the Secretary of State on 21 September will send a global message of the need to combat this threat to elephants and put pressure on other countries to act. The ban has not yet entered into force and we will consult on plans early next year. We will have to look at the impact of this change to current controls but it will put UK rules on ivory sales among the world’s toughest.