Appalled by the Illegal Trade in Elephant Ivory, a Biologist Decided to Make His Own
View on Smithsonian Mag website"It gets more complicated. If synthetic ivory were affordable, abundant and viewed by consumers as an acceptable substitute, it could drive down the price of real ivory enough to disincentivize poaching, says Carolyn Fischer, a senior fellow at Resources for the Future who has done academic research on trade in wildlife products. But if the prevalence of fake ivory removed the stigma of possessing real ivory, it could have the opposite effect.
'Ultimately, the net effect depends on whether the abundance of a substitute can drive down prices more than it spurs demand by diminishing the stigma,' Fischer said via email."
