24 May 2008 - Well-managed
wildlife trade has the potential to be even
more of a key development tool for the world’s
poor, finds a new report by the wildlife
trade monitoring network, TRAFFIC, and WWF.
Trading Nature: the
contribution of wildlife trade management
to sustainable livelihoods and the Millennium
Development Goals shows that a key development
advantage of wildlife trade is the opportunities
it offers to the very poor and the level
of involvement by local communities. But
many of the benefits are threatened when
illegal trade is allowed to flourish.
Excluding the products
of the commercial timber and fisheries industries,
the wildlife products covered in the report
include medicines, food, clothing, ornaments,
furnishings, pets, ornamental plants, zoological
and botanical display, research, manufacturing
and construction materials. As well as contributing
to the incomes of the poor, many also contribute
directly to their housing, health and other
needs.
The report finds that
well-managed, legal and sustainable trade
can have a significant impact on all eight
of the Millennium Development Goals, the
globally agreed roadmap which lay out targets
in development assistance and poverty reduction.
“Trade in wildlife products
can have a significant economic impact on
people’s livelihoods, childhood education,
and the role of women in developing countries,
provided it is legal, well-managed and sustainable,”
said Dr Susan Lieberman, Director of WWF
International’s Species Programme.
Wildlife trade can make
a direct major contribution to primary healthcare
too—the subject of three MDGs—through the
significant trade in wildlife-based medicines
of both plant and animal origin. Underpinning
the sustainable management of wildlife trade
is good governance, the key to MDG 8.
Trading Nature examines
a series of case studies. For example, Uganda’s
lake fisheries produce fish worth over US$200
million a year, employ 135,000 fishers and
700,000 small-scale operators in processing
trade and associated industries. It also
generates US$87.5 million in export earnings.
Analysis of the wild
meat trade reveals estimates of contributions
of up to 34% of household income in East
and Southern Africa. Wild meat is also providing
both an affordable source of animal protein
and a livelihood opportunity for men as
hunters and women as traders.
The report studies the
effects of the trade in peccary and caiman
skins and vicuña wool in Latin America.
The caiman skin trade generates a low income
for ranchers compared to cattle, but it
can be significant for the poor and landless
with few other income-generating opportunities.
The report suggests
incentives for the conservation and security
of natural resources upon which many livelihoods
depend. The legal, international trade in
wild plants and animals and the products
derived from them was estimated as worth
close to US$300 billion in 2005, based on
declared import values—and the value is
rising.
“Without good governance,
none of the other MDGs are truly attainable,”
said Steven Broad, Executive Director of
TRAFFIC.
“We call on governments
to pay greater attention to resource access
issues, and to develop innovative approaches
to address unsustainable harvesting of the
most commercially valuable wildlife commodities.”
Richard Thomas, Communications Co-ordinator,
TRAFFIC
+ More
Jail and penalty for
international smugglers
29 May 2008 - On 27
May, international smugglers were sentenced
to imprisonment and penalties as they were
found guilty of trading Amur tiger derivates
and bear paws between Russia and China.
The damage to the Far
Eastern Russia nature is huge: around 900
paws of brown and black bears, 4 tiger skins,
531 saiga horns and more than 60 kilos of
tiger bones.
WWF and TRAFFIC experts
were involved for independent expert evaluations
of confiscated wildlife products. They estimated
the commercial value to more than US$ 200,000.
The criminal group consisted
in six people: three Russian and three Chinese.
The most active members of the band, one
Russian and one Chinese, were sentenced
to 8 years of imprisonment and a penalty
of US$ 8500.
“The unprecedented huge
number of smuggled derivatives makes this
case highly interesting. The latest prosecution
marks the start of wildlife crime being
treated with the seriousness it deserves”,
said Natalia Pervushina, co-ordinator of
TRAFFIC’s Russian Far East programme.
“No damage was compensated
to the State from the criminal activity
of poachers” said Gennady Zherebkin, law
enforcement advisor of the WWF Russia Amur
branch.
“Unfortunately, this
is not the only case when the objects of
crime are the animals and plants and the
persons under trial are not condemned for
ecological crimes.”
The smugglers were caught
for the first time by law-enforcement services
in January 2007. They were transporting
8 bags of bear paws, 3 tiger skins, several
horns and various fragments of different
animals’ carcasses.
In March 2008, an attempt
to get some 120 bear paws across Khanka
Lake to China did not succeed as the police
managed to confiscate the goods. But the
criminals were able to flee.
+ More
Vast bounty at risk
from under protected oceans
26 May 2008 - Bonn,
May 26, 2008 –Oceans offer a vast bounty
to mankind – in food, climate and coastal
protection, medicine and new technologies
– a new WWF Germany study of the ocean's
value has found. But the ocean's bounty
is at risk from very low levels of protection
from over-exploitation.
WWF is urging the 190
Parties to the UN Convention on Biological
Diversity, now meeting in Bonn, Germany,
to conserve the wealth of our oceans.
“Countries have committed
themselves to establishing networks of Marine
Protected Areas by 2012 under the Convention
on Biological Diversity, but only 0.5 per
cent of the oceans currently protected is
a poor start towards that very essential
goal”, said Christian Neumann, Conservation
Officer for WWF International Centre for
Marine Conservation and co-author of the
study.
“Governments should
be doubling their efforts in Bonn to implement
the Convention on Biological Diversity”
said Rolf Hogan, CBD Manager at WWF International.
The value of our oceans
shows the economic value of a wide range
of goods and services from the oceans. Scientists
have put their overall value at some $US
21 trillion annually, a dramatic contrast
with the 0.5 per cent of ocean area currently
covered by marine protected areas.
“Not only do we have
the moral obligation to secure the biological
diversity of the seas, mankind is also dependent
on intact marine ecosystems,” said Neumann.
“They are a cornerstone of our economic
wellbeing. Protecting them is much cheaper
than loosing them.“
The wealth of the seas
is particularly apparent in medicine, as
many new compounds from pharmaceutical research
activities originate from the oceans. Sponges
and other invertebrates have emerged as
a particularly fruitful source of new antibiotics
and pharmaceutically active substances to
fight cancer and Alzheimer’s. Hotspot areas
of high biodiversity are valued at 6000
US Dollars per hectare for medicinal aspects
alone.
“We just don’t know
which potential is lying in the seas, waiting
to be discovered by medicine and technology.
The economic value is enormous, while very
difficult to assess. At the same time, we’re
at risk of loosing numerous species before
we have the chance to unveil their potential,”
Neumann said.
Global fisheries were
estimated at a first-sale value of $US 85
billion in 2004, with some 40 million workers,
but no only employment, the food of many
more millions is at threat from over-exploitation
and pollution.
“If we continue overfishing
at current levels, fish stocks will collapse
by the middle of the century. And that means
millions of jobs lost,” Neumann warns.
Coastal protection is
among the most important services of marine
life, of which intact protected coral reefs
contribute to a significant proportion.
This service has been valued at $US 9 billion
each year.
The oceans are binding carbon and therefore
contribute to stabilising the planet’s climate.
With no biological activity in the oceans,
the carbon concentration in the atmosphere
would be 50 per cent higher. This service
is valued at $US 0.66 to $US 13.5 trillion
per annum.
The report shows there
is more money to be earned by protecting
the seas than by destroying them. In Bunaken
National Park in Sulawesi, Indonesia, for
example, employees in the parks’ important
tourism sector earn 144 US $ a month compared
to fishermen on only US$44. A comparison
of 18 case studies in the Pacific, Atlantic
and Indian Ocean shows that turtle watching
generated three times more income than a
consumptive use of the endangered animals.
