HOW CAN THE ILLEGAL WILDLIFE TRADE BE DEFEATED

We are now two months into 2021, and it begs the perennial question of what can be done to make this a break-through year in successfully reducing the Illegal Wildlife Trade (IWT), and better protecting endangered and threatened species across the planet? 

The COVID-19 pandemic was devastating to humans and wildlife alike in 2020. African source countries throughout the continent experienced a total absence of tourists, resulting in thousands of Africans now out of work. The revenue portion normally generated by tourism to serve wildlife conservation and protection of wildlife has now been seriously depleted.

China and Vietnam are still the consumer epicenters of the global illegal wildlife trade threatening our Earth and human health. It is well known that the trade is not only pushing endangered species towards extinction, but destroying forests and threatening public health on a global deadly scale as seen with Covid-19.

A few examples show the trade was alive and well in 2020.

· 1 During 2020, 394 rhinos were poached for their horn in South Africa.

·   2(US$29 million) worth of pangolin scales was intercepted by the Nigeria Customs Service (NCS) in Lagos between February 2020 and January 2021,

·3 In June, poachers killed at least six elephants in a single day in Ethiopia, the largest such slaughter in memory in the East African nation.

·4  In November, Poachers killed 5 white Rhinos in the Okavango Delta in Botswana. In December twelve elephants were killed in Tanzania.

·5 In September, United States federal authorities closed a wildlife trafficking ring that had smuggled 10,000 pounds of shark fins into the country.

·6 A seizure in Mozambique included 5 Rhino horns from three different animals and 127 nails/36 canine teeth taken from more than 10 lions.

During the same time frame, wildlife seizures and arrests occurred in some African countries, Vietnam, China and other Asian ports of entry involving Ivory, Rhino horn and Pangolin scales. There are some doubts however, if some of these official seizures were done for political purposes to impress certain donors to provide extra funding for wildlife projects moving forward? There have also been arrests of poachers, low-level traffickers, middlemen, and syndicate kingpins who are jailed, but then freed on bail or released on technicalities due to weak evidence gathering and corrupt judicial systems.

Numerous high-profile conferences, meetings and workshops are convened on the subject of the Illegal Wildlife Trade costing sponsors millions of dollars annually. Many are hosted by Governments, Interpol, United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), and CITES to name a few. Considering the level of global enforcement resources present at these meetings, one would believe that unified planning, action strategies, and covert operations would be in the ascendancy. Unfortunately, the end product appears to be the opposite as they always fall short in terms of results, accountability and later fall into insignificance? 

7In 2018, at the Illegal Wildlife Trade Conference (IWTC) held in London, and chaired by Prince William, delegates attended from over 70 countries, including multiple charities and conservation organizations.

8The 16th INTERPOL Global Program meeting on Anti-Corruption, Financial Crimes and Asset Recovery, brought more than 60 senior investigators, judges and prosecutors from 18 countries to share experiences of investigating cases of corruption and recovering stolen assets.

The main ‘takeaways’ from these meetings were that African Governments agreed to sign a declaration of intent to eliminate the trade in their countries, and a proposal to set up a financial task force to investigate money laundering connections to the trade. (The respected NGO, ‘Born Free’ commented on the IWT conference that the organizers missed the chance to hold attending governments accountable within the declaration. Also, donor governments could have linked overseas aid and trade agreements to the IWT.) The Interpol Secretary General, Jürgen Stock stated that decisive action was needed to combat environmental crime and showed that 80 per cent of member countries considered it a national priority.  Has this been implemented into Interpol policy?

Based on these outcomes were the meetings really worth the time and expense? I understand certain action plans are covert but now three years later, there should be updates on how successful law enforcement operations by all parties attending have been in closing down the crime syndicates.

9Didi Wamukoya of the African Wildlife Foundation presented a frank African perspective to the US Congress on what is needed to combat emerging wildlife crimes and trafficking. She emphasized the dire need for Wildlife crime to be treated with the same seriousness as other crimes with bigger enforcement budgets. Park Wardens and Rangers are to be given a higher rate of pay and benefits, so it reduces the number of corrupt officials working with criminal syndicates. Lawmakers and judges across the continents must make sure the penalties are higher than the rewards in this trade and the crimes committed. Again, now that the US Congress has heard her testimony what is their action plan?

It is obvious no poaching solution is going to be successful without factoring in the effects of deprivation and poverty, which is evident in many village communities throughout Africa and Asia. These people not only live on the edge of wildlife reserves, but also on the edge of society when it comes to sustainable livelihood initiatives. New conservation education programs are also needed to lessen human wildlife conflict and enhance human wildlife coexistence. 

It is heartening to see African nations police and security forces finally working together to develop information exchanges and international cooperation to close down the syndicates at every level. It would be beneficial to see Asian and Americas range countries be integrated into the same system. So, based on this African ‘togetherness’, why can’t nations set aside their differences and expand their efforts on eliminating the illegal wildlife trade in their own backyards, and project a unified front to the world.

The question is how effective are these programs moving forward in terms of initiating Intelligence sharing, covert operations and database coordination among Source, Transit or Consumer countries?  The main focus should be strong law enforcement interaction with China and Vietnam as without their full cooperation the trade will continue to flourish. Do all countries have the will to work together and in conjunction with Interpol, the United Nations Office of Drugs and Crime (UNODC), and Transnational Crime Enforcement or do they have their own agenda? Transnational Organized crime cartels and corrupted officials who profit from this trade ignore toothless commitments and indifferent pledges! 

Let us hope 2021 will be the year when we finally see the ‘powers that be’ united and decisive in helping to conserve wildlife species before they end up as yet another killing statistic in the Illegal trade. 

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References: -

1 www.savetherhino.org/africa/south-africa/394...

2 Thespeakernewsjournal.com/world/illegal-pangolin...

3 abcnews.go.com/International/wire Story/elephants...

4 breakingnews.co.ke/many-rhinos-killed-by...

5 www.iisd.org/.../evolving-war-illegal-wildlife-trade

6 www.awf.org/news/awf-detection-dog-sniffs-out...

7 www.gov.uk/government/publications/declaration...

8 sic.gov.lb/ar /newsletters/list ?page=15

9 www.coons.senate.gov/news/press-releases/ sens ...

10 ww.traffic.org/what-we-do/projects-and...