China announced on Friday that it was banning all commerce in ivory by the end of 2017, a move that would shut down the world’s largest ivory market and could deal a critical blow to the practice of elephant poaching in Africa. 
 
 The decision by China follows years of growing international and domestic pressure and gives wildlife protection advocates hope that the threatened extinction of certain elephant populations in Africa can be averted. 
 
 “China’s announcement is a game changer for elephant conservation,” Carter Roberts, the president and chief executive of the World Wildlife Fund, said in a written statement. “With the United States also ending its domestic ivory trade earlier this year, two of the largest ivory markets have taken action that will reverberate around the world.” 
 
 According to some estimates, more than 100,000 elephants have been wiped out in Africa over the past 10 years in a ruthless scramble for ivory driven by Chinese demand. Some Chinese investors call ivory “white gold,” while carvers and collectors call it the “organic gemstone.” ||||| Image copyright AFP Image caption Kenya set alight 105 tonnes of ivory tusks in April to help tackle the illegal trade 
 
 China has announced a ban on all ivory trade and processing activities by the end of 2017. 
 
 Conservation groups hailed the decision as "historic" and a "game-changer" for the future of elephants. 
 
 The move follows a resolution at the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (Cites) in South Africa in October. 
 
 China has the biggest ivory market in the world - some estimates suggest 70% of the world's trade ends up there. 
 
 The war on elephants 
 
 Why elephants are seeking refuge in Botswana 
 
 Ivory can reach $1,100 (£850) per kilogram in China. 
 
 'Great leadership' 
 
 China's State Council announced the details of the ban on Friday. 
 
 The commercial processing and sale of ivory will stop by 31 March, and all registered traders will then be phased out, bringing a full halt to the market by the end of the year. 
 
 Conservation group WWF welcomed the latest news, calling it a "historic announcement... signalling an end to the world's primary legal ivory market and a major boost to international efforts to tackle the elephant poaching crisis in Africa". 
 
 Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption Alastair Leithead on the poaching problems in Botswana 
 
 Elly Pepper, deputy director of wildlife trade for the Natural Resources Defense Council, praised China for its "great leadership" on the issue. 
 
 "Setting such an aggressive timeline to close - once and for all - the largest domestic ivory market in the world is globally significant. 
 
 "It's a game changer and could be the pivotal turning point that brings elephants back from the brink of extinction," she said. 
 
 While the international market in ivory has been closed since 1989, legal domestic markets have continued in many countries around the world. 
 
 A surge in the killing of elephants over the past seven years has seen populations across Africa shrink by a third, according to the recently published Great Elephant Census. 
 
 China had backed the Cites resolution in October, surprising participants with the strength of its support for a ban. 
 
 Some delegates said Beijing had wanted an even stronger resolution.
– A year even more disastrous for elephants than it was for celebrities is ending with some great news for the species. China, by far the world's biggest market for ivory, announced Friday that it is phasing out the ivory trade and will have a complete ban in place by the end of 2017, the BBC reports. Conservation groups including the World Wildlife Federation praised the move as a historic step towards protecting elephants, which poachers have been slaughtering in huge numbers to supply the Chinese market. A 18-country "Great Elephant Census" released this year found that a third of Africa's elephants were wiped out between 2007 and 2014, with the population continuing to drop 8% a year. Around 70% of poached ivory is believed to end up in China. "Ivory traffickers have just lost one of their biggest markets," said Aili Kang of the Wildlife Conservation Society. Elly Pepper of the Natural Resources Defense Council described the move as "critical to saving the species." Beijing says commercial processing and sale of ivory will be halted by March 31 and trading will be phased out entirely over the following months. The New York Times reports that negotiations between China and the US may have speeded up the introduction of the ban. After Xi Jinping visited Washington in 2015, the White House released a statement saying both nations had agreed to " take significant and timely steps to halt the domestic commercial trade of ivory." (Poaching has caused more elephants to be born tuskless.)