The 96 Elephants campaign has asked the television program, Antiques Roadshow, to stop airing appraisals of ivory, even if it is antique. To help convince the PBS program, the campaign—run by the Wildlife Conservation Society along with dozens of partners—produced a satiric video capturing not the worth of ivory, but its cost (see below).
“Allowing any carved tusks or worked ivory—antique or not—into the marketplace furthers the existing loophole for illegal ivory and renders law enforcement ineffective. It sends a message to China and other consumer countries that it’s okay to sell raw and worked ivory, including ‘old’ stockpiles—further fueling the elephant poaching crisis. Our message to the public is simple: your family heirloom had its own family—don’t let elephants disappear,” John Calvelli, director of the campaign and WCS’s Executive Vice President for Public Affairs and Director.
The WCS campaign is named after the estimated daily death toll of elephants for their ivory, which amounts to over 35,000 a year. Forest elephants, which scientists say is a distinct species, have been hit the hardest: a recent survey found that 65 percent of the world’s forest elephants were slaughtered for their tusks in the last 12 years.
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