Kenya has banned the export of various snake species, including the African rock python, to zoos and pet shops around the world after reports of animal abuse and snakes being sold on the black market for their meat and skins. The trafficking of the endangered snakes by cartels is also having a negative impact on […]
Tag: wildlife trafficking
Wildlife for sale: Jaguars are the new trafficking victims in Bolivia
Bolivia introduced a general and indefinite ban on the wildlife trade two decades ago, but this measure has failed to stop the trafficking of wild animals. Birds, monkeys, turtles and reptiles that are in high demand as pets remain particularly vulnerable to wildlife crime. In recent years, jaguars (Panthera onca) have also become victims of […]
Wildlife for sale: An illegal activity out of control in Peru?
Peru is one of the most biodiverse nations on earth, home to one-tenth of the Amazon rainforest and other ecosystems. But its species are sought by collectors around the world and there is a thriving domestic trade in wildlife which together forms one of the country’s most profitable illicit economies running parallel to its impressively […]
POLL: Should the illegal trade in hippo teeth be stopped?
Kampala, Uganda – Investigators posing as buyers lured the suspects to a lodge near Buliisa, a town in western Uganda, as night set in. The two men arrived by motorbike with the contraband concealed inside a nylon sack. “They requested for me to take [the sack] inside a room,” one of the men, Fred Byenkya, […]
How wildlife may fare under Trump
What a president will do for wildlife has never been much of a campaign issue. Debates focus on national security, trade, economics, and to a lesser degree in this election cycle, on the environment. Wildlife, however, plays a part in all those concerns. Take, for example, the illegal wildlife trade. It’s a multibillion-dollar business that […]
POLL: Should the illegal trade in hornbill ivory be stopped?
A virtually unknown ivory poaching crisis is rapidly driving one of the world’s most spectacular birds to extinction, a global wildlife summit has heard. The helmeted hornbill, found mainly in Indonesia, Borneo and Thailand, has a solid red beak which sells as a “red ivory” on the black market, for several times the price of […]
Revealed: the criminals making millions from illegal wildlife trafficking
A major investigation into global wildlife crime today names for the first time key traffickers and links their illegal trade to corrupt officials at the highest levels of one Asian country. The investigation, published by the Guardian, exposes the central role of international organised crime groups in mutilating and killing tens of thousands of animals […]
How to catch a poacher using fake eggs
Sometimes life really does imitate art. In the fourth season of the hit TV show, Breaking Bad, police put GPS devices on barrels of methylamine to try and track the show’s protagonists to their meth lab. Inspired by the episode, Kim Williams-Guillen, a conservationist with Paso Pacifico, decided to take the concept one step further: […]