Endangered species: ivory

MADAM – We are all devastated at what is being proposed by the government in relation to ivory.

A New York law banning the sale of antique ivory has been challenged in court by two leading US antiques dealers associations.

MADAM – Thank you for printing my previous correspondence (ATG No 2337). If I thought that a ban on pre-1947 ivory would stop the death of 50 elephants I would stop writing.

MADAM – The government’s ill-conceived attack on antique ivory will likely mean that two pieces in my home – a 19th century Cantonese puzzle-ball chess set and my wife’s Corpus Christi acquired shortly after our marriage 50 years ago – now have no value in probate.

MADAM – Last year readers may recall a Victorian presentation ‘ivory tusk’ dinner gong was removed from display in one of the Royal Collection exhibitions.

BADA has clarified a key element of the government’s proposals for a near-complete ivory ban – the stipulation that all items qualifying for the ‘rarest and most important of its type’ and portrait miniature exemptions must be 100 years old.

ATG selects objects with ivory – from teasets to Art Deco figures – recently sold at auction that may become illegal to sell under the law

MADAM – I concur with everything that Michael Baggott wrote in ATG No 2235.

The art and antiques trade is calling on the government to re-think its planned restrictions on the sale of antique items containing small amounts of elephant ivory.

Roland Arkell and Noelle McElhatton on what the new ivory law could mean for art and antiques.

The general parameters of the government’s ivory ban, on the cards for years, are finally clear. As always with issues of CITES, the devil will be in the detail. Though the trade feels despondent in the face of the ban, a small concession on the currently very narrow 'de minimis' rule will make the ban a lot more manageable.

The new, as yet unnamed law will allow for narrow exemptions to the ban. These comprise:

MADAM – Defra’s findings outlined in the post-consultation document include an extraordinarily impractical provision for the ‘de minimis’ exemption – requiring registration (with an as yet unspecified fee) of all objects with an ivory content below 10% created before 1947.

The Department for Environment Food & Rural Affairs (Defra) is expected to publish a response to the ivory ban consultation this month.

MADAM – I was open-mouthed in disbelief to see again opinion discussed as fact when the ivory issue was aired on national television (ATG No 2334).

MADAM – I have pieces of antique elephant tusk ivory that I collected unconcerned about the (now well-known) conservation problems.

Leaders of four African countries have called on the UK and the EU to ban the trade in antique ivory to help stop elephant poaching.