- President Barack Obama announced a new Presidential Task Force on Wildlife Trafficking led by the Interior, State, and Justice Departments, and $10 million of new support for regional and bilateral training and technical assistance in Africa to combat wildlife trafficking. Both former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and current Secretary of State John Kerry have identified the issue as a priority for greater international cooperation.
- The president of Gabon, the president of the African Development Bank, the prime minister of Thailand, and the government of the Philippines have all made strong commitments to fight wildlife trafficking in the past year as well.
- The United Nations has formally recognised that money from trafficking in ivory is funding groups in Africa linked to terrorist organisations.
- The UK government has set up an international task force to tackle illegal wildlife trade, which recently convened in conjunction with HRH The Prince of Wales and The Duke of Cambridge. There is a further meeting planned for the autumn.
WWF welcomes these developments and praises the UK Government for being at the forefront of efforts to protect biodiversity and stop the illegal trade in wildlife. As part of a global campaign to promote international solutions to stop wildlife trafficking, WWF is calling on all governments – and particularly those of demand countries such as China, Vietnam, Thailand and the United States – to strengthen their response to the issue and clamp down on illegal trading networks.
As President Obama recognised, the fast-growing illegal trade in wildlife protects is threatening biodiversity, undermining the rule of law and funding organised criminal syndicates. In recent years, poaching has expanded beyond small-scale, opportunistic actions to coordinated slaughter by heavily armed gangs who are commissioned by international crime rings. Recent slaughters of elephants in Cameroon and Central African Republic are cases in point.
The rise in poaching has put iconic species such as elephants and rhinos at risk. This is tragedy in itself but also deprives the African continent of the economic, social, and environmental benefits of these protected species. Countries like Tanzania and Kenya are losing their natural resources – and the lives of rangers and law enforcement personnel – on a scale that merits international intervention.
Justin Tomlinson MP, “I will continue to work with organisations such as WWF & IFAW to tackle the illegal wildlife trade. I have highlight the issue to the UK government through parliamentary questions and directly supported campaigns to directly lobby international countries. It is crucial that we are now starting to see co-ordinated action, not only to protect the endangered animals, but to help break the link to terrorist organisations.”
