Russia digs up woolly mammoth remains for guilt-free ivory
Russia is mining the remains of its long extinct woolly mammoths to meet a growing demand for ethical ivory.
Taking advantage of a global ban on the trade in elephant ivory, Russia is gambling that ivory lovers around the world will pay a premium for ethically friendly mammoth ivory instead.
Michelle Obama, the US First Lady, has been spotted wearing jewellery crafted from the mammoth ivory.
It is exporting 60 tons of mammoth ivory to China, the world's biggest ivory market, per year, and scientists estimate there is plenty more where that came from.
In fact, they believe there may be as many as 150 million dead mammoths frozen beneath the Siberian tundra just waiting to be dug up.
"Every year, from mid-June, when the tundra melts, until mid-September, hundreds if not thousands of mostly local people scour the tundra in northern Siberia looking for mammoth tusks," a new report on the subject said.
Woolly mammoths are thought to have first appeared on the earth 4.8 million years ago and to have finallybecome extinct at least 3,600 years ago.
Yet as the permafrost beneath the Siberian tundra melts due to global warming their sometimes well-preserved remains are surfacing with growing frequency.
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