Advances in game hunting, wildlife trade and hunting sustainability

China is one of the largest consumer markets in the international legal and illegal wildlife trade. An increasing demand for wildlife and wildlife products is threatening biodiversity, both within China and in other countries where wildlife destined for the Chinese market is being sourced. We analysed official data on legal imports of CITES-listed species in five vertebrate classes (mammals, reptiles, amphibians, birds and fish), and on enforcement seizures of illegally traded wildlife, during 1997–2016. This is the first study that collates and analyses publicly available data on China's legal and illegal wildlife trade and considers a broad range of species. Specifically, we estimated the scale and scope of the legal and illegal wildlife trade, quantified the diversity of species involved, and identified the major trading partners, hotspots and routes associated with illegal trade. Our findings show that substantial quantities of wildlife have been extracted globally for the Chinese market: during 1997–2016 over 11.5 million whole-organism equivalents and 5 million kg of derivatives of legally traded wildlife, plus over 130,000 illegally traded animals (alive and dead) and a substantial amount of animal body parts and products, were imported into China. Although measures to reduce demand and alleviate poverty are crucial to curb unsustainable and illegal wildlife trade in the longer term, China's wildlife regulators and enforcers must take urgent measures to disrupt the supply chains from source to market.

Tanzania’s Ruaha landscape is prominent for its potential wildlife resources, which play a key role in sustaining the economy and livelihoods of the people. However, most of these resources are illegally obtained and traded in different places within and outside the Ruaha landscape. Due to its illegal nature, most of the important information regarding the trade is poorly documented. Therefore, the current study aimed first, to explore the origin and destination of wildlife products; second, to assess the relationship between hunters and buyers or customers; third, to assess the means used to transport wildlife products; and lastly, to assess who influences people to engage in illegal hunting and trade activities. In addition, we assess the materials used in the exchange of wildlife products. Semi-structured questionnaires and face-to-face interviews were used to collect information from 123 respondents. Social network analysis was used to indicate the origin and destination of wildlife products. The findings show that 70% of wildlife products originate from the Ruaha National Park and MBOMIPA wildlife management areas, with the remaining 30% originating from villages. The majority of respondents (65%) reported transporting wildlife products by foot and bicycle as the primary modes of transportation. Suppliers of wildlife products are reported to have close and long-term relationships with their customers and traders, with most of whom being friends and relatives. We found most poachers to be influenced by their friends and relatives in terms making decision to engage in illegal wildlife trade. In addition, crops like maize and rice were the most popular products used to exchange with wildlife products in the Ruaha landscape. Therefore, in order to combat illegal trade in wildlife products at the local level, alternative income-generating activities need to be promoted accompanied by not only well-funded anti-poaching programmes but also more effective surveillance plans. These should entail the use of advanced techniques and skills, such as wildlife forensics.

Humans have been exploiting natural ecosystems and their resources, driving many species to extinction at the expense of global human health, the welfare of wild animals, and the integrity of Earth’s ecosystems. Research has shown that the illegal international wildlife trade is of particular interest because it poses a serious threat to global health, biodiversity, conservation efforts, animal welfare, international relations, and biosecurity due to its clandestine and unregulated nature. Trafficked wild animals and wildlife products are moving between source and demand regions in the Americas, Africa, Asia and Europe. Despite a common misconception that consumers are primarily located in Asian countries, the EU is a major destination for legal and illegal wildlife trade, and certain EU countries function as transit points for illegal wildlife trafficking. Like Europe, the Middle East, including Türkiye, serves as a key transit hub for wildlife trafficking from Africa to Asia, yet no peer-reviewed studies assess Türkiye’s role in these networks. Motivated by the seizure of a baby gorilla at Istanbul Airport on December 22, 2024, this study aims to identify and analyze international illegal wildlife trade involving Türkiye. This study collated publicly available data sources, revealing 55 international wildlife trafficking seizure records involving Türkiye between 2011 and 2022. The seizure records were composed of mammals (64%, 35 records), reptiles (20%, 11 records), birds (7%, 4 records) and other species (9%, 5 records). A total of 34 countries were identified as countries of origin, transit, or destination in wildlife trafficking routes involving seizures where Türkiye served as either an origin, transit, or destination country between 2011 and 2022. The data indicate that international wildlife traffickers use Türkiye predominantly as a transit hub connecting Africa with both Asia and Europe, particularly for the trafficking of ivory, rhino horn and pangolin scales between 2011 and 2022. Total quantities of items trafficked during this period were 3,156 kg and 226 pieces of elephant ivory, 176 kg and 34 rhino horns, and 6,566 kg of pangolin scales. The variety of trafficked items, including live animals such as tortoises and African grey parrots through to rare instances like an infant gorilla, underscores the complexity of the illegal wildlife trade. National authorities’ commitment to law enforcement is evident from the seizures identified. The study offers practical recommendations to disrupt trafficking networks, improve data collection, and curb demand in consumer markets. By guiding policymakers, conservationists, and authorities, the study fosters international cooperation, optimal resource use, and endangered species protection. International wildlife trafficking can occur when detection and law enforcement measures fail in both the countries of origin and destination, and, where relevant, in transit countries, showing the necessity for governments worldwide to make the international illegal wildlife trade a priority.

Unsustainable global wildlife trade impacts biodiversity and threatens national and global security, but many aspects of this trade remain opaque. Our study is a novel investigation of the alleged links between the trade in wildlife products and in donkey skins. The global donkey skin trade is a newly prevalent and lucrative business, largely driven by Chinese demand for E‐Jiao, a traditional medicine derived from donkey skins. Records of donkey skins being seized alongside other wildlife products lead us to hypothesize that there is a link between these two trades. We identified all donkey skin dealers on seven business‐to‐business e‐commerce websites and obtained 14,949 data points. These were used in a network analysis to demonstrate the structure of the network and reveal the connection between the products, including wild animal and plant products offered alongside donkey skins. We identified at least 13 groups of CITES‐listed species in the densely connected donkey skin product network, demonstrated an association between the online trade in wildlife products and donkey skins, and discuss the implications of this overlap—including the potential to shed light on potential novel trade pathways in legal and illegal domestic animal and wildlife trade.

Having improved knowledge on global, regional and/or national trends in illegal wildlife trade is required to develop effective combating strategies. In this paper, nine years (2011–2019) data on illegal wildlife trade and trafficking (iwt) seizure records were used to explore trends in iwt activities in Ethiopia and to identify countries involved most in the iwt. Trends of iwt activities were assessed in two indicators: as relative transaction index (ti), and as relative weight index (for ivory [wi]) or as relative number of items for ivory and other wildlife products [ni]. To account for potential yearly variations in seizure rates, proxy variables to law enforcement efforts and effectiveness were used and predictive models that produced bias-adjusted estimates of relative trends in iwt activities were built. To explore the underlying reasons for the trend observed, relevant national officers were also interviewed to assess how well has been wildlife law enforcement working in combatting iwt in the country. Linear or polynomial regressions, where appropriate, were fitted to the seizure data to establish trends in transaction index over the nine years. A total of 842 incidences of iwt seizure instance reports, involving 18 animal species, were recorded in the country during the nine years period. However, the highest seizure (94%) rate was ivory and ivory products. Our results generally showed declining trends in both ti and wi or ni. The observed trend was also supported by the experts’ opinions and likely reflects the positive impacts of the country’s implementation of its wildlife laws. Other interesting findings of this study were that China represented the single most important destination country and Chinese nationalities were the most traffickers. In conclusion, the results provide detailed evidence to inform national and international decision making on key species implicated in the illegal trade. Similar periodic assessment of the situation of iwt within the country is needed to evaluate effectiveness of the country’s past and present measures and to revise its future combatting policies and strategies.

Use of the internet as a trade platform has resulted in a shift in the illegal wildlife trade. Increased scrutiny of illegal wildlife trade has led to concerns that online trade of wildlife will move onto the dark web. To provide a baseline of illegal wildlife trade on the dark web, we downloaded and archived 9852 items (individual posts) from the dark web, then searched these based on a list of 121 keywords associated with illegal online wildlife trade, including 30 keywords associated with illegally traded elephant ivory on the surface web. Results were compared with items known to be illegally traded on the dark web, specifically cannabis, cocaine, and heroin, to compare the extent of the trade. Of these 121 keywords, 4 resulted in hits, of which only one was potentially linked to illegal wildlife trade. This sole case was the sale and discussion of Echinopsis pachanoi (San Pedro cactus), which has hallucinogenic properties. This negligible level of activity related to the illegal trade of wildlife on the dark web relative to the open and increasing trade on the surface web may indicate a lack of successful enforcement against illegal wildlife trade on the surface web.

The illegal wildlife trade is a global threat to biodiversity as well as to public health and good governance. As legislation and law enforcement have been insufficient to protect many wildlife species, conservationists are increasingly focused on campaigns to help reduce demand for wildlife products. Social marketing is increasingly being used to support biodiversity conservation efforts, but the extent of its use has seldom been researched. Based on interviews with conservation practitioners, we assess the extent to which social marketing has been used in demand reduction campaign design. We do this by investigating the level to which demand reduction campaigns met the benchmarks defined by the UK’s National Social Marketing Centre. We focus on rhino horn and elephant ivory, two high-profile products in the illegal wildlife trade and in China and Vietnam given their role as key consumer countries. We also investigate how conservation practitioners view the opportunities and challenges of using social marketing in the context of reducing demand for illegally traded wildlife products. Our findings highlight that there are substantial gaps between best practice in social marketing and current practices in the design of demand reduction campaigns. However, several elements of social marketing are widely utilized and a platform exists from which to build more comprehensive behavioral influence campaigns in future. In terms of future needs, practitioners highlighted the need for independent consumer research upon which to build target audience insights, a focus on broader audience segments beyond the product consumers, and the improvement of collaborations across institutions.

The gravity of wildlife trade

Vietnam is home to four species of otters, and while population numbers are unknown, they are thought to be rare and in decline. Studies on the illegal otter trade in Asia have shown Vietnam to be a key end use destination for illegally sourced live otters for the pet trade and otter fur for the fashion industry. This study focused on the otter trade in Vietnam through seizure data analysis and an online survey, revealing the persistent trade of otters in Vietnam in violation of national wildlife laws and the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES). We found a substantial quantity of otter fur products for sale though CITES permits for such products were lacking, indicating illegal origins. Similarly, all four species of otters are protected in Vietnam, yet they were openly available for sale online in violation of national wildlife laws. Clearly, the online trade of wildlife and wildlife products in Vietnam requires greater monitoring, regulation, and enforcement to prevent the advertising and trade of illicit wildlife. In-depth scrutiny of online sellers and product sourcing is particularly warranted. To support enforcement efforts, revision of policies and laws is needed to hold social media and other online advertising companies accountable for enabling the illegal trade of wildlife.

The illegal wildlife trade (IWT) is a lucrative, clandestine trade that endangers animal welfare, damages native biodiversity and undermines the rule of law. Despite enhanced law enforcement focus and increased litigation, the illicit trade of wildlife and wildlife products has continued to flourish. The increase in the IWT can be attributed to a lack of identifiable relationships, risk functions and reward systems specific to each stakeholder in this illicit market. The increase in the IWT indicates that domestic and international regulations are not effective in their intent of preventing the illegal trade of various wildlife species. Without a clear understanding of stakeholder relationships, resources will continue to be wasted on ineffective prevention and detection methods with regards to the IWT. Law enforcement strategies rely on identifying key stakeholders in the IWT as well as their perceived motivations, risks, and relationships. These definitions may provide further insight into the motivations driving these individuals participating in this illicit market and may contribute to more successful interventions. Stakeholders and their associated roles within the IWT have been defined to serve as a tool to understand the various risk/reward utility functions in global markets. This study provides a framework support for policy makers by establishing baseline risk/reward systems for each stakeholder which can be built upon as intelligence surrounding these stakeholders increases.This article is categorized under: Jurisprudence and Regulatory Oversight > Communication Across Science and Law Jurisprudence and Regulatory Oversight > Interdisciplinary Collaboration

There are calls to ground policies aimed at addressing the illegal wildlife trade (IWT), and biodiversity conservation more generally, on the best available evidence. However, evidence on IWT can be highly uncertain and difficult to obtain due to the illegal nature of the trade. Even when the evidence exists, there are numerous barriers to its uptake by decision makers, pertaining to the evidence itself and to the characteristics and contexts of those using it. The surfacing of the illegal trade in jaguars Panthera onca provides an example of how evidence is, and is not, used for decision‐making on IWT. We interviewed 38 conservation practitioners in Belize, Guatemala and Honduras, who had knowledge about, or experience dealing with, illegal jaguar trade. Interviewees described their information sources and decision‐making processes, and explicitly and implicitly prioritized jaguar trade evidence, based on attributes like the evidence's source, the scale and purpose of the trade, its temporal and spatial dimensions and the nationality of offenders. Even though interviewees stated that they use scientific evidence to make decisions, they gave more weight to evidence involving foreign actors and commercial purposes than local and non‐commercial ones, paying less attention to the potential impact on jaguars or the source of the information. They were also more inclined to favour events that were spatially and temporally closer to their own reality. Our results show that the interpretation and uptake of evidence are subject to contextual constraints and personal biases, which are common across fields and sectors, even amongst experienced decision makers. We propose an approach for evaluating evidence and informing decision‐making within IWT and biodiversity conservation. Our approach aims to guide conservation decision makers and practitioners to assess the relevance and uncertainty of the evidence, to recognize their own interpretation biases, to identify the actions that are appropriate based on the evidence and to improve the transparency of their decisions. It can also guide evidence ‘producers’ to develop evidence that is more aligned to conservation policy and practice. This approach can contribute towards more evidence‐based practice within the field of biodiversity conservation, with applications to IWT and beyond. A free Plain Language Summary can be found within the Supporting Information of this article.

This study looks at the environmental impact of the illegal trade in the world's fourth largest wildlife and aims to combat it. By setting two project objectives, namely strengthening law enforcement and enhancing community economic capacity, with the government as the focus client. In the data processing stage, the government of Vietnam was identified as the target client by assigning weights using the Analytical Hierarchy Processing (AHP) and entropy weighting methods and combining the weights through the Minimum Information Entropy (MIE) and Lagrange Multiplier (LM) methods. In terms of project impact quantification, an intervention analysis model is introduced to establish the ARMI-Intervention-SVR series of models, and the PSO algorithm is used to find the best fitting parameters of the SVR model to improve the model performance. After combining the intervention prediction models, it was concluded that the impact of the Vietnam project on the five-year transaction volume of illegal wildlife trade was 31.22 per cent, 28.87 per cent, 18.25 per cent, 13.77 per cent and 12.31 per cent, respectively. These results provide an important reference for effectively combating illegal wildlife trade and are of practical significance.

The Laos borders with China, Myanmar, and Thailand have been identified as vulnerable hubs for illegal wildlife trade. In particular, some special economic zones (SEZs) in Laos are linked to illegal wildlife products, including tiger bones, rhino horn, and ivory for sale. SEZs are zones granted more free market-oriented economic policies and flexible governmental measures. In this study, we conducted on-site observations to identify high-valued wildlife, including (parts of) tigers, rhinos, bears, and pangolins in 2 of the 13 SEZs—the Golden Triangle and Boten SEZs—and conducted semistructured interviews with anonymous participants in 2017 and 2019. The trend regarding illegal wildlife trade in these SEZs seems to fluctuate. In the Golden Triangle SEZ, we found that the illegal trade in wildlife is present but occurs more covertly than previously observed; the trade transformed underground to online social media. In Boten SEZ, we found a decrease in bear bile products and an increase in the volume of tiger products openly for sale. Informants explained that the decrease of openly sold wildlife in the Golden Triangle SEZ has been influenced by media and political attention as well as inspections from local authorities, while in Boten SEZ, illegal wildlife traders diversified into tiger products, due to the decline in bear bile products and the reduction in the opportunity to obtain them.

All species of big cats, including tigers, cheetahs, leopards, lions, snow leopards, and jaguars, are protected under the Convention on the International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES). This is due in large part to population declines resulting from anthropogenic factors, especially poaching and the unregulated and illegal trade in pelts, bones, teeth and other products that are derived from these iconic species. To enhance and scale up monitoring for big cat products in this trade, we created a rapid multiplex qPCR test that can identify and differentiate DNA from tiger (Panthera tigris), cheetah (Acinonyx jubatus), leopard (Panthera pardus), lion (Panthera leo), snow leopard (Panthera uncia), and jaguar (Panthera onca) in wildlife products using melt curve analysis to identify each species by its unique melt peak temperature. Our results showed high PCR efficiency (> 90%), sensitivity (detection limit of 5 copies of DNA per PCR reaction) and specificity (no cross amplification between each of the 6 big cat species). When paired with a rapid (< 1 h) DNA extraction protocol that amplifies DNA from bone, teeth, and preserved skin, total test time is less than three hours. This test can be used as a screening method to improve our understanding of the scale and scope of the illegal trade in big cats and aid in the enforcement of international regulations that govern the trade in wildlife and wildlife products, both ultimately benefiting the conservation of these species worldwide.

Reviewed by: Exploiting the Wilderness: An Analysis of Wildlife Crime by Greg L. Warchol Tariro Kamuti BOOK REVIEW of Warchol, Greg L. 2017. Exploiting the Wilderness: An Analysis of Wildlife Crime. Philadelphia: Temple University Press. 208 pp. Illegal wildlife trade is one of today's foremost challenges, and it has caused heated debates in contemporary conservation narratives, especially concerning how to address it in the face of the risk of extinction of some species. The book offers an eagle's-eye view by parsing the broad spectrum of issues related to illegal wildlife trade from the local to the global scale, with a focus on the "activities of individuals, informal networks, and criminal syndicates that target a range of animals and plants for personal use and profit" (5). The content of this book is clear, simple, concise, and layperson-friendly while being useful as a quick reference guide for experts. The author speaks from experience to give an empirically based exposition of, for instance, the intricate networks of illegal wildlife trade syndicates in particular countries in eastern and southern Africa, where he traveled extensively for more than fourteen years. Getting to the core of the illegal wildlife trade requires some explanation of the crime and its causes. Warchol finds no "simple explanation of this offense," as it is "driven by a myriad of influences that are the product of historical developments, opportunities[,] and consumer trends" (77). There is no better way to present this conundrum, which refers to how these historical developments shifted human–nature relations in ownership of, access to, and ultimately benefits derived from natural resources. For example, the transition from traditional African systems of managing wildlife resources to the colonial system of protected areas and private property rights (at the expense of people as they were relocated, marginalized, and eventually alienated from wildlife) caused tension between colonial powers and the dispossessed. As if that were not enough, the slow rate of land reform and genuine effort to mainstream the marginalized, which has been witnessed in the aftermath of the transition to self-rule in some African states, has perpetuated this skewed relationship, mired in resentment and resulting in further marginalization. In the same vein, there is a need to understand the markets that fuel the illegal wildlife trade. Warchol's use of descriptive social science research and applied criminological theory is helpful in this regard. It is the story of the poacher who always hogs the limelight, while in fact, he is only part of a long distribution chain, which eventually feeds the silent but rich consumer far afield. For this reason, one would argue that inasmuch as Exploiting Wilderness defines the "trade in wildlife" from the onset by focusing on the "legal and illegal components" (2), there is a need to problematize poaching in conjunction with consumer demand, as these concerns are not mutually exclusive to the distribution chain of wildlife products. This is because local communities shoulder the blame as poachers, right at the beginning of the distribution chain. They bear the brunt of deprivation while living close [End Page 143] to wildlife, and they face a state that has to coordinate the safeguarding of wildlife resources. This is a tall order for developing nations (which constitute the major source of illegally traded wildlife products), burdened with numerous other primary challenges, which require huge financial resources and institutional capacity. The entrenchment of militarized approaches to conservation has become a bone of contention from a human rights perspective, despite efforts toward strengthening the justice delivery system. Exploiting the Wilderness is a welcome contribution for attempting to expose the complexities of the illegal wildlife trade. It ends by outlining potential scenarios to provide various points of departure for those with a passion for species survival, sustainable communities, and stable states through collectively nurturing and equitably harnessing their natural resources. Tariro Kamuti University of Cape Town Copyright © 2019 The Trustees of Indiana University