Ethical Ivory

Sylvain Cordier / Gamma-Rapho / Getty Images

Where did the ivory trade go after China banned elephant tusks? North, into the Russian permafrost — where an estimated 10M frozen mammoths lie waiting, and a kilogram of tusk fetches up to $1,900.

Mammoth tusks came to be known as “ethical ivory” after China banned imports of elephant tusks in 2017, closing the market that elephants were being slaughtered to supply. China and Hong Kong are home to the world’s most developed tusk-carving industry, in which a single piece can sell for as much as billions of rubles (tens of millions of dollars). Meeting that demand fell to Yakutia‘s tusk hunters, who dig the frozen ivory out of the permafrost. The independent Siberian outlet People of Baikal describes how this punishing trade works — and what the hunters may be costing science and themselves. Meduza has translated the story in full.

Meduza has the full story.