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

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what steps he is taking to help prevent illegal ivory entering UK markets.

Since 2016, Defra and the Home Office have contributed £300K per year to the running of the National Wildlife Crime Unit (NWCU). The NWCU helps prevent and detect wildlife crime, including illegal imports of ivory, by obtaining and disseminating intelligence, undertaking analysis which highlights local or national threats and directly assisting law enforcers in their investigations.

In addition to this, once commenced, the Ivory Act will introduce one of the toughest bans on elephant ivory sales in the world by banning the dealing in items made of or containing elephant ivory, regardless of their age, unless they fall within one of the narrow and carefully defined exemptions. We intend the ban to come into force in spring 2022.