... This meeting was a good opportunity to gather two different views on Japan's position regarding the ivory trade: the NGO side represented by Airi Yamawaki and the government side represented by Saeko Terada. Tears of the African Elephant supports the proposed ban for Japan's ivory market and wished that all African elephant populations had been uplisted to Appendix I in Johannesburg, while the Ministry of the Environment prefers to keep the ivory market open and states that due to an increase in numbers, the African elephant populations mentioned above cannot be uplisted.

We started the session with the screening of The Ivory Game depicting the illegal trade in elephant tusks including conservationists battling poachers, investigative journalists following the money trails, wildlife law enforcement NGOs leading undercover investigations and black market traders in China. After the film, we contextualize the role of Japan into the ivory trade - something absent from the movie. Airi Yamawaki and Saeko Terada both described their respective work regarding the issue and answered questions from the public... [Click here to continue reading]
— Cécile Sarabian