Worried over the booming online illegal trade of two species of otters — the Asian small-clawed otter and the smooth-coated otter — India along with Bangladesh, Nepal and Philippines are seeking complete ban on all international commercial trade in the water loving mammals for their protection.

The four Asian nations  have moved a proposal in this regard at the forthcoming 18th Conference of the Parties (COP18) to the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) to be held in Sri Lanka in May, 2019.

Currently, both the species are listed on Appendix II of CITES, which allows regulated international trade. If the CITES members approve the proposal, these carnivores, whose number is dwindling owing to habitat loss and increasing online trade for pets in various countries, would be transferred to Appendix I, banning all global commercial trade.

More than two-thirds of all the CITES Parties in attendance must vote to adopt the proposals for the ban to take effect. CITES is an international agreement between governments that sets regulations on the trade in wild animals and plants.

Both species of the otters are currently listed as ‘Vulnerable’ on the IUCN Red List but wildlife activists warn that growing online demand will put further pressure on the species in the wild.

In fact, recent investigations by TRAFFIC, the wildlife trade monitoring network, has revealed that their  populations have declined by more than 30 percent largely due to destruction of their habitat and exploitation for the global trade in otter skins and pet trade.

Nobody knows exactly how many Asian small-clawed otters or smooth-coated otters are left in India and Southeast Asia, but the general consensus is that numbers are declining.

Overall, there  are 13 species of otter, all listed in the IUCN Red List which live in Europe, Asia, Africa, North, Central and South America: Eurasian otters, smooth-coated otters, Asian small-clawed otters, hairy-nosed otters, sea otters, North American river otters, neotropical otters, giant otters, Southern river otters, marine otters, African clawless otters, Congo clawless otters and spotted-necked otters.

In the past 35 years, seizure records reveal that otters are traded in around 15 Asian countries, the majority being in China, India, and Nepal. However, in recent years, there have been a growing number of seizures of “live otters” in Southeast Asia which suggested an emerging trend of otters being caught for the commercial pet trade in this region.

A TRAFFIC report released last year revealed all. Researchers found 560 advertisements for up to 1,189 otters over a four-month period in 2018. In addition, the report found that 59 live otters, most of which were juveniles, were seized by officials from 2015-2017. From 2015 to 2017, four Southeast Asian countries confiscated 59 otters in 13 seizures, most of them in Thailand and Indonesia where commercial breeding may be taking place, the group said, with at least 32 seized en route from Thailand to Japan.

According to the International Otter Survival Fund, the mother otter is often killed by poachers so they can capture the cubs.

“Chances of survival for newborn otters in the trade appear to be low; this is reflected from the juvenile otters which that offered at a higher price as a result of increased survival chance.

However, the much higher volume of newborn pups supplied in the trade indicates that otters are indiscriminately extracted from the wild, even as a newborn, despite the risk of death.

“While each trader individually sells a small number of otters each time, the overall volume of the trade itself is significant, raising concerns for the wild populations of smooth-coated otter and Asian small-clawed otter” noted a report titled “Illegal pet trade on social media as an emerging impediment to the conservation of Asian otters species,” published in the December 2018 edition of Journal of Asia-Pacific Biodiversity.

“Weak national laws hinder enforcement action and widespread trade in otters online throws the survival of remaining wild populations in Southeast Asia into question,” said a regional TRAFFIC official, Kanitha Krishnasamy in the report.