Our precious heritage of flora and fauna, some rare and endangered, are at risk due to poaching and lack of governmental will. We need to act now before it is too late, and before our forests are emptied of their rich cover
It is well known that tigers are killed for the illegal market for virtually every part of their body — skin, bones, whiskers, claws, teeth, even its testicles. But few of us know that virtually all of our wildlife is up for sale in the booming wildlife market — driving rare creatures to extinction — largely unchecked, and with little awareness of the extent of the trade, or even the species involved.
One of the ‘hottest’ items in wildlife trade, for example, is the pangolin, a creature few have heard of or even seen in the wild. Pangolins are secretive, nocturnal and, when threatened, curl their scaly-armoured body into a tight ball. While this protects them from natural predators, it also makes it easy for poachers to capture them alive. India is a major ‘supply point’ for the pangolin trade, and seizures have been reported from Mizoram, Karnataka, West Bengal, Uttarakhand, Odisha, Assam, Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh, among other States. Pangolin scales are believed to cure various diseases from headaches and cancers to impotence — even though such ‘medicinal’ properties are dubious since the scales are made up of keratin, the same substance as human nails and hair. Pangolin meat is also considered a delicacy, primarily in South-East Asia. The trade in pangolins is well-organised and lucrative, along the lines of that in ivory and tiger parts. To give an idea of the trade, over 2,00,000 pangolins were seized between 2000 and 2012 and since the wildlife trade is clandestine, these numbers represent just the tip of the iceberg.
It is not just pangolins, though.
Turtles, frogs, pheasants are killed for the table, dolphins for oil, sharks for their fins, star tortoises make for exotic pets, butterflies and beetles are collectable items, parakeets, munias, doves and hill mynas feed a thriving cage-bird trade, owls are mere ingredients for black magic, bears butchered for their bile, sea horses and spiny-tailed lizards are medicines for impotent souls, monitor lizards, otters and snakes are slaughtered for their skins... the list is endless, virtually no wild creature is spared from the gun or the trap.
TRAFFIC-India, a programme division of WWF-India, recently organised a workshop which got together wildlife experts, policymakers, scientists, research scholars, conservationists, senior officials from the State forest departments, Union Ministry of Environment, Forests and Climate Change, enforcement agencies, Wildlife Institute of India, Wildlife Crime Control Bureau and NGOs to draw attention on, as well as work out strategies on, measures to prevent this illegal trade in lesser-known species.
It is estimated that in India, 7,00,000 birds are illegally trapped and about 70,000 tonnes of sharks are caught off our shores. All primate species in the country, from the rhesus macaque to India’s only ape, the Hoolock Gibbon, are also traded for reasons ranging from black magic to experiments to meat and as pets. The seminar also drew attention on little known aspects of the trade such as fresh water fish for the aquarium trade. The levels of exploitation on these species are rarely reported, but a recent study published in Biological Conservation estimated that 1.5 million freshwater fish belonging to 30 threatened species were exported from India between 2005 and 2012.
There is a booming trade in spiders, butterflies and beetles, destined for private collections mainly in Japan, Russia, Germany and the Czech Republic. The ‘source’ sites are some of our richest, most bio-diverse forests of North-East India, the Western and Eastern Ghats, and the western Himalayas.
There is a hot trade in star tortoises and there are steady reports of massive seizures of tortoises, procured mainly from the forests of Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu, stacked in suitcases on their way out from Chennai airport — a transit point of the trade. The wildlife market has also expanded from a ‘physical’ entity to a 'virtual’ one. The advantage it offers is anonymity, with many species like star tortoise, butterflies and beetles being sold off the internet too.
Most of the trade goes unchecked. While in India the Wildlife Protection Act, 1972, bans trade in most species, the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species regulates trade across borders. But enforcement is poor, and awareness about micro-fauna, even among the enforcement agencies, is minimal.
It is important that we take the gravity of this crime on board, the ramifications of which go far beyond threatening rare and endemic species-or even extinction. The market for lesser-known species form a significant part of the global illegal wildlife trade which is second only to arms and narcotics in scale, and is annually calculated at over $25 billion worldwide, and is a known source of funding for global terrorist activities. Importantly, India is a major ‘supplier’ of wildlife and its products — from tigers to pangolins to snow leopards and otters to tokay geckos. To deal with this serious crime we have a woefully under-equipped and toothless Wildlife Crime Control Bureau. To give an idea, the Bureau has one inspector for the entire northern region, and it does not even have the power to access phone call details directly, which is crucial to crack crime cases. It is imperative that we strengthen the Bureau and bring it on par with other enforcement agencies.
While the demand drives trade — be it local or international — and there have to be sustained efforts to curb this, protection must begin at home. A critical step here is to strengthen the frontline forest staff, our first line of defence to protect endangered wildlife. Ensuring sufficient well-trained and motivated frontline staff, equipping, enabling and empowering them should be the priority in our battle against wildlife crime. Also of importance is sensitising other relevant departments and enforcement agencies such as the judiciary, police, customs, Army and paramilitary agencies like the Border Security Force, Indo-Tibetan Border Police, Seema Suraksha Bal stationed at trade routes on the border. They need to be oriented and in identifying protected species, schedules and laws protecting them, etc.
At another level, there needs to be sufficient coordination between various Government departments and ministries so that they work in cooperation and not in conflict. For instance, the Botanical Survey of India estimated that over 90 per cent of wild medicinal plants were threatened, but sources say that many of these are still being promoted by Government ayurveda bodies. Similarly, over 35 species of freshwater fish that are threatened are promoted by the Marine Products Export Development Authority for export.
We need to act now before it is too late, and our forests emptied of their rich biodiversity.
(The writer is trustee, ‘Bagh’, member, State Board for Wildlife, Uttarakhand, and a former member of the National Board for Wildlife)