Wildlife smuggling and trafficking activities are increasing rapidly worldwide. Illegal wildlife trade is the third most lucrative criminal industry in the world after drugs and firearms. Wildlife crimes do not exclude Malaysia from being involved. Shockingly, the increasing numbers were supported with the existence of platforms like social medias and online store applications.
If we are able to pretend like a potential buyer, we could easily straight away find the suppliers after searching them in facebook or instagram. Try to put in keywords such as "wildlife", "exotic", "pets", and "rare species" in the search box and you will find a list of exotic animal sellers, not just locals but also abroad. Strangely, the available exotic animals in market include those rare species and obviously they were trafficked from another countries.
EXOTIC PETS
Most popular species demanded by buyers as pets are Malayan Pangolin (tenggiling), baby monkeys, and civets (musang), which can be bought as low as RM800. The buyer only need to pay half deposit for booking and the rest can be paid after receiving the animal. Other favorite animals for this business including sugar gliders, estuarine crocodiles, female owls, phoenixes, orang utans, sun bears, gibbons, parrots, and wild eels.
It is believed that the sellers obtain the exotic animals directly from random farm owners or villagers who are experts in animal hunting. Their commissions are low but the market prices are profitable. Most of customers are the exotic animals enthusiasts. They are willing to put high price just to get the specific species.
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| 65 Malayan Pangolins value of RM75,000 seized by Malaysian Guard, for smuggling attempt into Thailand. (Photo - Bernama) Location - Bukit Kayu Hitam. |
EXOTIC FOODS
Furthermore, some buyers also request for endangered species such as wild eels, snakes, and tortoise to be their exotic foods. These species offered high price and there are always customers await for stock up. Animals that are confiscated from the smuggling and trafficking activities out from Malaysia, or vice versa, will be handed over to Department of Wildlife and National Parks (PERHILITAN) Peninsular Malaysia.
ORNAMENTS
Other than making these exotic animals as pets and foods, there are another reason why wildlife crimes are actively performed. Animals like elephants, rhinos, tigers, and turtles are hunted for their body parts, in particular their tusks, horns, skins, and shells. The demands always involve endangered species. This is the most worrying part.
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| Seized ivory tusks before destroyed at waste management center. (Photo - theSundaily). Location - Port Dickson. |
FUTURE HOPE
In order to protect wildlife, public need to strongly understand the existing laws and regulations regarding wildlife protection enactments and acts. We must understand that buying or selling wildlife animals are illegal and crime. In fact, being a part of the trades could lead to worsen ecosystem. As I always said in previous posts, imbalance ecosystem will affect human eventually. It involves long term biodiversity loss and ecological problems namely sex-ratio imbalance and slowing reproduction rate of vulnerable species. The methods used by poachers to kill or capture animals and the way animals are handled are often extremely cruel, thus fail to comply with animal welfare standards. Furthermore, many transportation and concealment methods are harmful to animals. Many specimens fall ill, injured, starve or die in transit.
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| Provided hotline to report wildlife crime in Malaysia. 1 800 88 5151 |
Local authorities also need to fight these crimes down to initial roots in order to ensure the nature sustainability. This can be done through more collaborations between government agencies and other institutions. There is also a need to enhance the enforcement enclosing not only inside the country but regionally/globally. Supporting bodies like NGOs, Interpol, World Customs Organization, etc, are among the influential efforts to achieve those objectives. Awareness and educations are also crucial to educate people about consequences of wildlife crimes. Let's reduce consumer demands!
SUSTAINING ALL LIFE ON EARTH! STOP WILDLIFE SMUGGLING.
I thought bela baby monkey tu okey. Kalau dah ter bela, how? Sebab orang kampung selalu selamatkan baby monkey kena serang beruk tua.
ReplyDeleteBetul. Kes selamatkan monyet/kera/beruk kat kampung ni banyak kan. Walaupun kalau ikutkan law, memang kena serahkan haiwan tu kepada PERHILITAN. Tapi monyet2 tu pun dah memang asal daripada sekitar kampung tu, so dah memang itulah habitat dia. I rasa tak jadi masalah sangat. Melainkan berlaku kes aniaya/dera haiwan/ atau jual beli, baru lah law ni akan terpakai kat orang kampung yang bela monyet tu.
ReplyDeleteJawapan ni pandangan I je. Tak mewakili mana-mana organisasi. Tak semestinya betul. Kalau you nak tahu lebih serius, boleh contact hotline yang I provide kat atas ni.