Thailand's ivory market is driving the African continent's elephant poaching crisis, conservationists say, accusing the kingdom of backtracking on pledges to tackle the issue.

According to the wildlife group, TRAFFIC, the number of ivory products on sale in Bangkok grew almost three-fold from 5,865 in January last year to 14,512 in May 2014.

Thailand is a known hub for the illegal trade in elephant tusks from Africa and has come under pressure to ban the sale of ivory from domestic elephants.

The legal domestic trade is blamed for making it easier to smuggle ivory into Thailand from other countries, most of which is made into ornaments or taken to China and Vietnam where tusks are used in traditional medicine.

In its latest report, TRAFFIC says the amount of ivory on sale in Bangkok could not have come from Thai elephants alone.

"Thailand's efforts to regulate local ivory markets have failed... their nation's ivory markets continue to be out of control and fuel the current African elephant poaching crisis," said TRAFFIC's Naomi Doak.

Between January and December 2013, the number of shops in the capital, Bangkok, grew from 61 to 105.

Ms Doak estimates that up to 80 percent of the ivory in Bangkok is sourced from outside Thailand.

The Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) has warned of industrial-scale poaching to meet demand for ivory in Thailand and China, with more than 20,000 African elephants poached in 2013 alone for their tusks.

Thailand agreed at a CITES meeting in Bangkok last year to implement an action plan to tackle the problem, including better regulation of ivory sellers and adding African elephants to its list of protected species.

Ms Doak says the timeline for the plan was too long.

She has called on Thai authorities to suspend domestic sales of ivory until "enforcement agencies are given the power to effectively enforce the law".

The Deputy director general of Thailand's Department of National Parks, Wildlife and Plant Conservation, Theerapat Prayurasiddhi, says the kingdom is trying to control the trade.

He says that conservationists should also focus on where the illegal trade originates.

"When we can have better control, the trade will be more strict and illegal trade will decrease," he said.

AFP