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Date: April 30, 2024 Tue
Time: 1:43 am
Time: 1:43 am
Results for lions
4 results foundAuthor: Chardonnet, P. Title: Managing the Conflicts Between People and Lion: Review and Insights from the Literature and Field Experience Summary: Not long ago, when large mammals harmed people we talked of accidents; when they damaged people’s assets we referred to incidents. Nowadays, human/wildlife conflicts are regarded as common occurrences. It seems that what were once considered exceptional or abnormal events have become normal or usual. Whether this is a result of higher frequency and amplitude is not clear, because we do not have reliable statistics to make accurate comparisons. Similarly, human-eating and livestock-raiding lions might be seen as normal lions expressing their carnivorous nature in particular circumstances. Contemporary lions are not wilder or crueller or more dangerous than before: it is just that these particular circumstances seem to be recorded more frequently. Also, communication is now instant and universal: news of a casualty in a remote wilderness can be reported at once on the internet, spreading the information worldwide. Furthermore, a problem lion seems to have a greater psychological impact than a problem crocodile: a crocodile victim disappears, but a lion victim is more likely to be noticed; also, according to B. Soto, a lion incident might be perceived as an intrusion into the human environment, whereas a crocodile incident might be viewed as a human intrusion into the crocodile environment. The result is that the lion might be regarded as more at fault than the crocodile, even though the consequences are the same. In any case, the interface between humans and wildlife is increasing: growing human population and encroachment into lion habitat have simply augmented the incidence of contact between people and lions. Similarly, the harvesting of wildlife has increased, leaving less natural prey for lions. Obviously, the probability of clashes between people and lions now tends to be higher. Longestablished traditional ways of deterring fierce, fully-grown lions might become partly ineffective, and lethal methods are not always acceptable by modern standards. Triggers for human eaters and cattle raiders are being investigated, and knowledge of behavioural factors is improving. New methods to protect people and livestock from lions are being tested in a number of risk situations; these methods are also designed to conserve the lion itself from eradication over its natural range. Conservation of the lion is now a topical concern because our ancestors, the hunted humans (Ehrenreich, 1999) of the past who were chased by predators have become hunting humans and predators themselves. Interestingly, this study was undertaken during a period of rising general interest in conservation of the lion. Two regional strategies for the conservation of the African lion have been developed under the auspices of the Cat Specialist Group of the World Conservation Union/Species Survival Commission, one for West and Central Africa, the other for Eastern and Southern Africa.1 And more and more lion-range states are developing national action plans. This provides evidence of the effort invested in tackling the diverse issues related to lion conservation. By focusing on the human/lion interactions, the present study is complementary to the work of the World Conservation Union. This study also echoes the dynamic forum facilitated by the African Lion Working Group.2 We hope that this review will contribute to the challenge of long-term conservation of the African lion. Success will be attained when the lion changes from being perceived as vermin or a pest to being regarded as a wealth or an asset. Details: Rome: Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Naitons, 2010. 69p. Source: Internet Resource: Wildlife Management Working Paper 13: Accessed December 1, 2012 at: http://www.fao.org/docrep/012/k7292e/k7292e00.pdf Year: 2010 Country: United States URL: http://www.fao.org/docrep/012/k7292e/k7292e00.pdf Shelf Number: 127084 Keywords: Human-Animal ConflictIllegal HuntingLionsWildlife ConservationWildlife CrimeWildlife Management |
Author: Williams, Vivienne Title: Bones of Contention: An Assessment of the South African Trade in African Lion Panthera leo Bones and other Body Parts Summary: Lions are listed in Appendix II of CITES (the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora), which means international trade in live animals or body parts can only take place under a strictly controlled permit system. Prior to 2008, the only record of South Africa issuing CITES permits to export Lion skeletons was for three units to Denmark in 2001. However, Lion bone exports from South Africa have increased dramatically in recent years. From 2008 to 2011, the official number of skeletons legally exported with CITES permits totalled 1160 skeletons (about 10.8 tonnes on bones), 573 of them in 2011 alone, with 91% of them destined for Lao PDR. The North West, Free State and Eastern Cape, all home almost exclusively to captive-bred Lions, were the only provinces to issue export permits. Not all Lion bone trade in South Africa has been legal, however. In 2009, a Vietnamese national was arrested and later deported for being in possession of Lion parts without permits, while in June 2011 two Thai men were arrested after being found with 59 Lions bones. "The trophy hunting industry..is the main source of carcasses once the trophy hunter has taken the skin and skull," say the report's authors. Numbers of Lions at breeding facilities in South Africa almost doubled from 2005 to 2013 when around 6188 animals, some 68% of the national total, were in captivity, many destined for the lucrative trophy hunting industry, which generates around USD10.9 million per year. However, the report finds: "there is no economic incentive to farm Lions solely for their bones, especially given the costs involved in raising Lions and the current prices paid for skeletons." Nevertheless, the value of bones generated as a secondary by-product of the trophy hunting industry has allegedly motivated farmers to dig up previously discarded carcasses originating from trophy hunts and captive mortalities and whereas female Lions formerly had little or no trophy hunting value to breeders, the emergence of a market for bones has generated a previously overlooked value. The authors recommend Lion breeding facilities are closely monitored to restrict opportunities for abuse of the system for financial gain. The authors speculate that bone exports to Asia may be connected to Lion bone being used as a substitute for Tiger bone in tonics. In 2005, TRAFFIC found evidence that African Lion bones were an ingredient in "tiger bone strengthening" wine produced in Guilin, China, and distributed in Tiger-shaped bottles, but with Lion bones as an approved ingredient. The authors also note the difficulty of distinguishing Lion from Tiger bones. With more than 280 Tigers captive in South Africa, they recommend DNA spot checks of shipments to verify their origin and also in the report provide some guidance, based on skeletal characteristics, on how to distinguish the two species. The reports also notes the large discrepancies in information on Lions in South Africa: between 2004 and 2010, 2950 Lions were registered as having been hunted there - yet CITES export permits indicate 4088 trophies for the same period, a difference of more than 1100 trophies. Several reasons are proposed to explain the discrepancies, including specimens incorrectly described as trophies and animals not being hunted in the same year as the permits are issued. The authors recommend a number of improvements to recording systems, including development of an integrated national system for issuing permits that can be crosschecked by all enforcement and Customs officials. They also make a pragmatic blanket recommendation that measures currently in place to impede opportunities for illegal activities are strengthened across the entire supply chain from Lion breeding to skeleton exports. Details: Cambridge, UK: TRAFFIC, 2015. 128p. Source: Internet Resource: Accessed July 17, 2015 at: http://www.traffic.org/home/2015/7/16/new-study-throws-light-on-south-africas-lion-bone-trade.html Year: 2015 Country: South Africa URL: http://www.traffic.org/home/2015/7/16/new-study-throws-light-on-south-africas-lion-bone-trade.html Shelf Number: 136097 Keywords: Animal PoachingLion Bone TradeLionsWildlife CrimeWildlife Trade |
Author: EMS Foundation Title: The Extinction Business: South Africa's 'Lion' Bone Trade Summary: For more than a decade, South Africa has been actively supporting and growing the international trade in big cat bones, despite local and international outrage and condemnation from conservation and protection organisations, lion scientists, and experts. In 2017, South Africa's Minister of Environmental Affairs, Edna Molewa, controversially, and in the face of vociferous opposition and robust arguments against this trade, set the annual export quota at 800 lion skeletons. Even more alarmingly, Molewa, without stakeholder participation, took the incomprehensible decision to almost double the quota in 2018 to 1,500 skeletons. On July 11th 2018, the person in charge of the quota at the DEA told us categorically that no quota had been set for 2018. A few days later the DEA was forced to make a public announcement about the 2018 lion bone quota following a public outcry when a letter from Molewa, dated June 7th 2018, informing the provinces of the new quota allocation, was leaked. The undeclared reasons behind government's decision to conceal this information from interested and affected parties needs to be brought to light and interrogated. The Department of Environmental Affairs (DEA) justified its decision to dramatically increase the quota on a single government commissioned interim study which, from the get-go guaranteed a skewed outcome, particularly because of the inclusion of outspoken pro-trade economist, Michael 't Sas-Rolfes, in the small research team. The report itself admitted that the findings were based on insufficient data and that "further avenues need to be explored". By no stretch of the imagination can this interim study translate into a conclusive scientific justification for a lion bone quota, and even less, an increase of the quota. Notably, some of the researchers involved in this study have distanced themselves from the decision-making process around the 2018 quota, stating that all the decisions were made by the Scientific Authority and the DEA, and that the researchers provided no input on what the quota should, or should not, be. They specifically added that "The wording of that quota letter via NW [NorthWest] is a bit unclear concerning our involvement...we provided no input on what the quota should, or should not, be. We correctly excluded ourselves from this process." In the last 18 months, the EMS Foundation and Ban Animal Trading have been gathering extensive information and investigating South Africa's international 'lion' bone trade. This data has provided the basis of our Report, The Extinction Business: South Africa's 'Lion' Bone Trade. The South African captive big cat industry is a pariah and it is under severe local and international scrutiny. Hunting associations that support the trophy killing of captive bred lions have been sidelined by international hunting associations and organisations. Instead of working with all the stakeholders to limit and close down the industry, South Africa is steadfastly supporting it. It is facilitating its conversion into an even crueler industry: captive breeding and farming lions so they can be slaughtered solely to feed the problematic big cat bone trade in Southeast Asia. This is evidenced by the emergence of lion slaughterhouses in South Africa as well as the fact that we have clear evidence that 91% of the 'lion' skeletons exported from South Africa in 2017 included skulls. Thus showing that South Africa's lion bone trade is not a by-product of an existing industry (i.e. trophy hunting) but an entirely separate industry. Consequently, a trade in wild animal body parts, with links to international criminal networks, in countries where they are attempting to lower demand for big cat body parts, is being stimulated. Alarmingly, the Minister is unpersuasively attempting to argue that this abhorrent and destructive industry is a sustainable, and ethical alternative to trophy hunting. By doing so, true conservation efforts that should benefit wild animals in this country, as well as its citizens, are being undermined. A ban on the captive breeding of lions and tigers will bring an end to this unacceptable and brutal South African industry. The DEA, however, refuses to recognise this and instead, for inexplicable reasons, chooses to intensify its support for an industry that is tarnishing Brand South Africa's image. South Africa's tourism industry is suffering reputational damage, and this will, in turn, have a negative impact on South Africa's economy and job creation. A vast number of individuals rely on continued employment in the tourism sector, and their livelihoods are in the firing line in order to benefit only the few predatory elite in the 'lion' bone trade. When it comes to the economics of the 'lion' bone trade on the South African side - after all, this is what is driving the trade - there is almost nothing in the public domain about the modalities of the industry and/or the processes and mechanisms of how the money flows along the entire supply chain. Access to this information and transparency is crucial, not only to understanding the nature of the trade, but in gaining insights into the illegal trafficking links. The South African government urgently needs to open up this industry, and its participants, to public scrutiny so that it can be fully and accurately interrogated, understood, and the money trail monitored. The illegal trade in wild animals, which is not only devastating animal communities and consuming huge financial resources, cannot be adequately tackled without addressing the significant loopholes in the existing legal trade multilateral agreements, i.e. CITES. Drawing upon hundreds of CITES export permits, issued by South Africa's conservation agencies, this Report examines and investigates substantial problems and endemic loopholes in the CITES permitting, enforcement and oversight system. It further demonstrates the failings of South Africa's national policies and procedures, all of which translate into a convergence of the legal and illegal trade in wild animal. Systemic weakness in the international wild animal trade permitting regimen, particularly in South Africa and Asia as illustrated in this Report, not only add to wild animal trafficking, but also undermine any efforts to address the illegal trade. It is also clear that transnational wild animal trafficking networks and crimes perpetrated against wild animals cannot be disrupted without examining the legal and regulated trade, and the supply and demand chain thereof. Indeed, the critical mechanism to disrupt transnational organised wildlife crime is to critique and amend the legal trade. Our findings reveal that: - There are substantial loopholes in the CITES permitting system itself; Merely complying with the CITES Treaty is insufficient and is a threat to wild animals and biodiversity. Countries need to do more in the context of their own national legal frameworks to protect wild animals caught up in the international trade; - There is a lack of verification, one example of this is that more than the 2017 set quota of 800 skeletons went out of South Africa with legal CITES permits; - There is a lack of required due diligence by the CITES Management authorities on both the exporting and importing side, in profiling and authenticating exporters, importers, addresses and destinations; - There are major oversight problems in South Africa and in the countries of import. This has created a situation where the legal trade in 'lion' bones is fueling the illegal trade in lion and tiger bones and providing laundering opportunities for tiger bones in Asian markets. This is brewing into a toxic mix, particularly when it is placed in the context of the widespread overlap between those involved in international lion trade, trade in tigers and other CITES-listed species, and the routine leakage of imported lion products into illegal international trade. Details: Honeydew, South Africa: EMS Foundation, 2018. 122p. Source: Internet Resource: Accessed July 25, 2018 at: http://emsfoundation.org.za/wp-content/uploads/THE-EXTINCTION-BUSINESS-South-Africas-lion-bone-trade.pdf Year: 2018 Country: South Africa URL: http://emsfoundation.org.za/wp-content/uploads/THE-EXTINCTION-BUSINESS-South-Africas-lion-bone-trade.pdf Shelf Number: 150918 Keywords: Animal ExtinctionIllegal Wildlife TradeLionsTigersTrafficking in WildlifeWildlife ConservationWildlife CrimeWildlife TradeWildlife Trafficking |
Author: Williams, Vivienne Title: South African Lion Bone Trade: A Collaborative Lion Bone Research Project Summary: The African lion is the only big cat listed on CITES Appendix II, and the only one for which international commercial trade is legal under CITES (Williams et al. 2017a). Debates on the contentious trade in lion bones and body parts were amplified at the 2016 CITES Conference of the Parties (CoP17) when consensus on a proposal by Chad, Cote d'Ivoire, Gabon, Guinea, Mauritania, Niger, Nigeria and Togo to transfer all African populations of Panthera leo (lion) from Appendix II to Appendix I of CITES could not be reached, and many southern African countries in particular opposed the proposal. Instead, through negotiations within a working group, a compromise to keep P. leo on Appendix II with a bone trade quota for South Africa, was agreed as follows: A zero annual export quota is established for specimens of bones, bone pieces, bone products, claws, skeletons, skulls and teeth removed from the wild and traded for commercial purposes. Annual export quotas for trade in bones, bone pieces, bone products, claws, skeletons, skulls and teeth for commercial purposes, derived from captive breeding operations in South Africa, will be established and communicated annually to the CITES Secretariat. CoP17 underscored a need for further information on lion trade and the consequences for lions across the continent. And, in accordance with the annotation, South Africa was required to establish an export quota for lion bones, and the Scientific Authority was mandated to advise the Department of Environmental Affairs (DEA) on the size of this quota on an annual basis. Following consultation with various relevant government agencies (national and provincial) and other stakeholders (including a public meeting on 18 January 2017), the 2017 export quota was set at 800 skeletons (with or without the skull) in July 2017. No specific export quotas were set for teeth, claws or individual bones; these items are included in the quota as parts of a skeleton. In order to provide sound scientific decision support to the DEA, an interdisciplinary and collaborative research project led by two independent experts, Dr VL Williams (VLW) and Mr M 't SasRolfes (M'TSR), was commenced in March 2017 and will end in March 2020. This interim report is the first in the series of report backs on the research to SANBI. The core aims of the collaborative research project, as given in the collaboration memorandum, are: 1. To increase understanding of the captive breeding industry and the trade in lions (especially bones, but also other products and live lions) in South Africa; 2. To investigate how the trade in captive-produced lion skeletons and other body parts under a quota system affects wild lion populations; 3. To strengthen the evidence base for the annual review of the lion bone export quota in order to ensure it is sustainable and not detrimental to wild populations. The lion bone trade also interacts with the recreational hunting industry and may affect other felid species internationally; accordingly, the project also aims: 4. To gain a better understanding of the consequences of the US ban on imports of captive-origin trophies that took effect from the start of 2016; 5. To gain a better understanding of potential linkages between markets for lion body parts and those of other large felids in and beyond Africa. In respect of the aims, various sub-projects and/or data analysis activities were initiated in 2017, namely: 1. The National Captive Lion Survey: an online questionnaire survey distributed to South African facilities that breed, keep, hunt and trade in lions (live and/or products) (commenced August 2017; ongoing, but to be closed in 2018 on a date to be determined; the focus of this report) (various collaborators); 2. Analysis of data supplied by multiple information sources: analysis of available data (see Table 1) to inform the evidence base; 3. Muthi market monitoring: a project tracking the presence of lion parts (mainly skins) in traditional medicine outlets/markets (commenced January 2017; ongoing) (VLW only; not SANBI funded). Details: South African National Biodiversity Institute, 2017. 31p. Source: Internet Resource: Interim Report 1: Accessed July 30, 2018 at: https://conservationaction.co.za/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/2017_Interim-Report-1.pdf Year: 2017 Country: South Africa URL: https://conservationaction.co.za/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/2017_Interim-Report-1.pdf Shelf Number: 150968 Keywords: Animal PoachingLion Bone TradeLionsWildlife CrimeWildlife Trade |