Not all of the bans are the same. You might be referring to the ban that was announced late 2015 (IIRC) which was a temporary ban for a year to see if it works.

Meh, they do this a lot. Every year they talk about how coal will be banned in Beijing next year, or that they'll stop harvesting organs from condemned prisoners, and so on. Just for them to repeat the same pledge next year. The Chinese gov promises arent credible, and something isn't a sure thing until they really do it.

> The Chinese gov promises arent credible, and something isn't a sure thing until they really do it.

It's a first step. I think that this is slightly different from either of those because

a.) the money in this industry and the number of people depending on it is only a fraction of those of coal mining

b.) people will never need ivory the same way they need organs

Even though they do have a long way to go, promising that they will do something about it is the first step.

They (the families in charge) own most of the ivory themselves and this is just like promising to be good. Remember when Xi's entourage stocked up on ivory on an official trip to Africa?

http://qz.com/292268/chinese-officials-allegedly-smuggled-iv...

Like they need convenient access to organs for Guanxi oriented transplants, they want nice ivory to decorate their villas. The fact that they aren't subject to Chinese law (until they are expelled from the party) anyways makes this very easy.