There is no escaping the fact that countries from which wild tigers have been wiped out or virtually wiped out in recent years – Cambodia, Laos, Vietnam and China – are countries where the tiger has been valued solely for the sum of its body parts.
The major threat to the world’s remaining wild tigers is poaching to meet the high demand in Asia for their parts and derivatives. This demand is exacerbated by the legal trade in lion bone so long as they were sourced from captive-breeding facilities in South Africa
41 countries and the EU adopted the London Declaration on Illegal Wildlife Trade, committing to tackle this multi-billion dollar transnational crime. This report summarises the key findings of our preliminary assessment and reiterates recommendations which should be made a priority for time-bound implementation
Between 2010-15, nearly 30 per cent of tigers seized in illegal trade were suspected to be sourced from captive operations. Tiger farming and trade in captive tiger parts and products poses a serious challenge to enforcement and demand-reduction efforts
The U.S. Pelly Amendment to the Fisherman’s Protective Act of 1967 provides for the President to prohibit imports of any product from a country which is certified by the Secretary of the Interior as engaging in trade which “diminishes the effectiveness of any international program for endangered or threatened species”.
EIA has cached many of the online resources referenced in our report Hidden in Plain Sight: China’s Clandestine Tiger Trade. These resources are available below for researchers and interest parties; most are in their original Mandarin, although we have provided some unofficial translations