Sir-We wish to express our concern over the resumption of a limited international trade in elephant ivory. The Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) has allowed Namibia, Zimbabwe and Botswana to sell 59.8 tons of stockpiled ivory to Japan. The sales began in April, ending a ten-year ban. They are termed 'experimental' , suggesting that, if deemed a success, further sales will be proposed. When these sales were initially approved in June 1997, an important condition was attached-that a system should be developed to measure the impact of trade on elephant populations. The recent authorization reflects the satisfaction of CITES with a draft of a trade and elephant monitoring system called MIKE (Monitoring Illegal Killing of Elephants). We feel that the approval of MIKE was inadvisable. This programme may be able to measure large-scale changes in populations, but it cannot gather the details needed to link subtle changes to causes.
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