Education can end Asia wildlife trade, says expert

Friday, June 10, 2011
Luke Hunt
Radio Australia News

Stuffed into four suitcases at Bangkok international airport last week were 450 rare and endangered turtles - and they were immediately seized by officials.

But the discovery highlights growing concern over animal poaching in Asia.

A previous find at the same airport included four leopard cubs, a bear cub, a monkey and a red-cheeked gibbon.

In a separate case, a Bengal tiger cub was seized. Further arrests have been made across the border, where Laos and Cambodia have struck deals with Vietnam in an effort to curb poaching and protect what is left of their wildlife.

Scientists are warning that up to half South-East Asia's wildlife will disappear this century if authorities fail to curb the smuggling rackets.

Rhino

It appears that the warnings are being heard, and understood.

Malaysia is leading a bid to save the Sumatran rhinoceros - in serious danger of extinction, with perhaps just 15 to 30 left on the east coast of north Borneo.

Tony Lamb, who has worked the Malaysian agricultural and horticultural departments for 40 years, told Radio Australia's Asia Pacific: "There were people who came in unseen, unnoticed and would camp for three months in the forests and find the territories of the rhinos and then dig traps.

"And basically they would sell everything - the rhino hide, the horn. So that's why rhinos are now down to something like 15 or so."

Malaysia has achieved much in rescuing orang-utans and pigmy elephants from extinction.

Precarious

Shark fishing has also been banned and many Chinese restaurants are refusing to sell shark fin soup.

But hundreds of other species are still in a precarious position.

Lamb said: "It's been a matter of demand for their parts especially in China and Thailand.

"So the sun bears for their gall bladders were hunted very, very heavily and they're now really threatened.

"The same for the pangolins. that were exported out for medicine in China and other parts of Asia.

"I think the dugongs were a similar thing that they were also prized for their tusks for medicinal purposes."

Sridhar Lakshmana, managing trustee for the Base Camp Social Research Foundation, said south-eastern Indian marine life is under threat, with dugongs, turtles and sharks popular among poachers who on sell to China and Japan.

He said: "What I think the international community can do is to have a much more coordinated effort, to see who are the final end consumers." The poachers were only local fishermen, and hard to apprehend, he said.

"I don't think it's possible to achieve any of this without the contribution of the community and raising awareness levels within the community that I would say should be the focus if you really want to clamp down.

"Just looking at it as a law and order problem and putting people behind bars will just make the trade more secret."