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A pangolin retrieved from the illegal trade last week 7 August 2020

IN THE NEWS – Four pangolins rescued in a week from illegal trade

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On the 7th of August 2020, Sheree Bega from the Saturday Star wrote this story from information supplied by the African Pangolin Working Group. There has been a poaching spike out there with many  pangolins being retrieved – this is about one of the busiest weeks we had in July.

In just over a week, Ray Jansen and his team have recovered four trafficked pangolins – three of them pregnant – in sting operations from the illicit trade in various parts of South Africa.

In total, 11 people were arrested by a team of dedicated and specialised law enforcement officers.The operations are a sign, says Jansen, of the African Pangolin Working Group, that pangolin poaching has resumed under Level 3 lockdown restrictions.

“It’s just gone mad. The lockdown at the end of March shut all borders, people’s movements and poachers couldn’t move animals over the border from Zimbabwe or wherever. The risk being associated with moving a poached protected species was a hell of a lot higher with all the road blocks and army blocks.

“So it literally collapsed up and when we moved from Level 4 to Level 3, it just went bang and opened the trade all over again. We’ve seen an increase in normal poaching as people have gotten laid off, companies close and work opportunities crash. Rural communities are really in huge trouble and local poaching of porcupines and antelope have skyrocketed as people don’t have money to feed their families.”

Pangolins are the most heavily trafficked mammal on the planet and rank among the most trafficked wildlife species on the continent.

The demand largely for their keratinous scales, used in Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM), and for their meat in south-east Asia has created a lucrative illicit market run by transnational criminal syndicates.

In SA, around 16 pangolins have been intercepted in the illicit trade this year. While the international trade has crashed under Covid-19 lockdowns, Jansen says he expects a “huge increase again as ports start opening and the economies starts to open.

“I have good intelligence that in the DRC, Vietnam and Nigeria, they’re stockpiling scales and I think once the ports open we’re going to see a huge movement of the illegal wildlife trade products again.”

So far this year, around 10 tons of scales have been intercepted in Africa – last year this time it was around 70 tons. “I don’t think the trade stopped, I do think it’s being stockpiled.”

Last year, authorities intercepted more than 97 tons of scales from Africa representing over 150 000 animals. But the real poaching onslaught is far higher – only 10% of the illicit trade is intercepted, says Jansen.

A pangolin retrieved from the illegal trade last week in a sting operation on the N4. 7 August 2020.

In June, the Chinese government outlawed pangolin scales as a raw ingredient in TCM (Traditional Chinese Medicine). However, the Environmental Investigation Agency found pangolin scales are still listed as an ingredient in patent medicine formulae found in the official reference book, meaning they can still be legally traded and used.

“The ban is the best news for pangolins I’ve heard in the past 10 years I’ve been working on this order. It’s a massive and monumental step forward for the conservation of a multitude of endangered species including pangolins.

“The loophole is a huge problem because everyone is just going to go and patent their products. But the large majority of commercially available remedies in China are effectively banned, which is huge. I do think China will rule to outlaw it completely and I look forward to that day.”

Jansen is optimistic this will “eventually trickle down to the guys on the ground doing the poaching, that it’s not lucrative anymore and it’s time to do other things.

“This lag period between banning it and removing it out of the trade and taking it from the financial reward, it may take up to a year,” he said.

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IN THE NEWS – Chinese lawmakers propose a ban on the sale of pangolin products for traditional medicine

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Reblogged from the Environmental Investigation Agency (see the original post here)

Members of China’s National People’s Congress, the country’s legislature, have made a public announcement to propose a ban on the use of pangolin products for traditional Chinese medicine (TCM).The proposals will be presented at this year’s annual NPC sessions, which started on 5 March.In 2016, the Congress signed into law a revised version of the country’s Wildlife Protection Law. The Environmental Investigation Agency had previously raised concerns about ambiguities and loopholes in this law, particularly those which sanction the continued trading and use of wildlife at risk of extinction.

Article 27 allows for provincial forestry departments to issue permits for the sale of pangolin scales. These were reported to number 27 tonnes on average annually between 2008-15.

The permits are used by designated hospitals and licensed companies that produce and sell TCM products containing pangolin.

“The position taken by China’s lawmakers proposing a ban on the use of pangolins in TCM is an encouraging sign there is support for closing domestic pangolin markets in China,” said Chris Hamley, the EIAs Senior Pangolin Campaigner.

“China’s continued use of pangolin scales and meat is a major driver of poaching and trafficking across the pangolin’s range.”

The EIA strongly urges China’s leadership and legislators to adopt the proposal for a ban on the use pangolins in TCM. Doing so would demonstrate a significant commitment to addressing one of the major driving forces in the rapid decline in wild pangolin populations across Asia and Africa.

For more background on this issue, read the EIA analysis of China’s revised Wildlife Protection Law.

Witness pic

IN THE NEWS – Outrage over ruling in pangolin case

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The following article was written by Sharika Regchand and published by the Witness

Outrage greeted news on Thursday that the 42-year-old man who tried to sell a pangolin in Pietermaritzburg was given a R240 000 fine or alternatively a wholly suspended three-year sentence.

Pietermaritzburg magistrate Reard Abrahams took into consideration that Isaac Mutero had already spent a year in jail awaiting sentence.

The chairperson of the African Pangolin Working Group, Professor Ray Jansen, said he was outraged.

“It is ridiculous and quite pathetic of our judicial system. The National Environmental Biodiversity Act prescribes a sentence of 10 years or a R10 million fine or both.

“I am quite disgusted. The police went to a lot of trouble to apprehend the illegal wildlife trafficker who was trying to sell the pangolin in a public mall in Pietermaritzburg.”

Jansen added that pangolins are a “highly endangered species”. It has the highest protection status of any endangered species in SA, including the rhino and elephant.

He said the pangolin had been treated by the group and was in intensive care for over two weeks before it died. Treatment alone cost between R30 000 and R40 000.

Mutero pleaded guilty last year to contravening the National Environmental Management Biodiversity Act. He said in a plea at the start of the case that the scaly mammal got into his brother’s homestead in Zimbabwe. He thought it would be a good idea to bring the animal into the country to protect it because people in Zimbabwe killed pangolins.

Mutero said in the written plea that his intention was to sell the animal to Croc World in Scottburgh. He said he thought the buyer he was meeting when he was arrested — in January last year at the Brookside Mall — was from Croc World.

Abrahams stressed the seriousness of the offence. He said pangolins are facing extinction and that they are being poached for medicinal purposes and nutrition.

He said the mitigating factors included that Mutero was married, had four children and had no previous or pending cases. He had also pleaded guilty, indicating remorse.

Mutero has also been in custody for over a year, he said. The aggravating factors were that Mutero did not verbally testify and take the court into his confidence.

The magistrate said the court would have liked to have questioned him about how he had brought the pangolin into SA without the authorities finding out.

Had they known, they would not have allowed it to be smuggled into the country.

Another aggravating factor was that the pangolin died, because the anteater was not given its special diet. “It is difficult to believe he had the best interests of the pangolin at heart and was not swayed by monetary gain.”

Surely Zimbabwe had its own wildlife centres the pangolin could have been taken to, he said. He also found it strange that Mutero was employed in Amanzimtoti, not too far from Croc World, yet he was arrested in Pietermaritzburg, where he tried to sell the pangolin.

The original article can be read here