main meeting in Zimbabwe . The President Robert of Zimbabwe argued that elephants took up a lot of space and drank a lot of water . The elephants have to pay for their own “ room and board ” with their ivory . Several African countries made CITES an offer : They would honor the ivory ban only if they were allowed to sell the ivory from elephants that had been died of natural causes . In 1989 it is estimated that one elephant was killed every 10 minutes . In 1990 the sale of ivory was banned by CITES . The Japan Experiment CITES agreed to a compromise , authorizing a one-time-only “ experimental sale ” by the three countries to just Japan . In 1999 Japan bought 55 tons of ivory for five million dollars . Japan immediately said it wanted more , and soon China would want legal ivory too . In July 2008 the CITES approved China ’ s request to legally buy ivory . Member countries agreed , and that fall Botswana , Namibia , South Africa , and Zimbabwe sold more than 115 tons of ivory to Chinese and Japanese traders . Allowing legal ivory trade should have kept the price down and limited smuggling . Instead China limited the supply and the price went up for the legal ivory . This meant even more smuggling of illegal ivory . According to Kenneth Burnham , the official statistician for the CITES program , it is “ highly likely ” that poachers killed at least 25,000 African elephants in