The 1989 international ban on commercial trade in ivory was implemented by the international community because of very real concerns about the trend towards extinction of many African elephant populations. Between 1979 and 1989 poaching for ivory reduced the continental population from 1.3 million to 609, 000 elephants. During the 1980s the international ivory trade averaged some 800-1,000 tonnes per year, representing the slaughter of up to 100,000 elephants annually. These figures do not take into account the thousands of baby elephants which died each year as orphans.