The recently concluded 20th Conference of the Parties (CoP) of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) in Samarkand, Uzbekistan has produced several notable successes for the conservation of threatened fauna, effectively prohibiting international trade of whale sharks, manta and devil rays, oceanic whitetip sharks, guitarfishes and wedgefishes, and improving international protections for several other fauna from global trade, as well as several species of vulture species, big cats, reptiles and plants. This latest meeting of CITES parties, including India, added 78 new species to the CITES appendices, regulating their international trade. Several international fora have welcomed the science-based decisions reached by country parties at the CoP20 to increase protection for biodiversity from international wildlife trade. However, the improved international cooperation and regulation that emerged from this latest gathering of parties has shed light on the rising domestic trade in wildlife in India.
CITES is a global environmental agreement established in 1973 to regulate trade in wildlife through a system of permits and certificates covering species listed in three Appendices assigned using biological and trade criteria to ensure that international trade does not threaten their survival. Since then, CITES has expanded to 184 signatory countries, including India, and currently covers nearly 41000 species. Of these, around 1,100 species (700 fauna and 400 flora) that are severely threatened with extinction are placed in Appendix 1, with total restriction on commercial trade. The vast majority of around 39,000 species are placed in Appendix 2, with limited commercial trade monitored by export permits and licenses. As CITES and other multilateral environmental agreements, such as the Convention on Biological Diversity (UNCBD) and the Convention on Migratory Species (UNCMS), play a pivotal role in regulating global transnational wildlife trade, the focus is increasingly shifting towards domestic trade and consumption of wildlife. Strong support exists for CITES in the international community, and among conservation and science NGOs, and for strengthening the enforcement of CITES trade regulations. However, despite being in existence since 1973 and entering into force in 1975, CITES has largely fallen short of meeting its stated goal - of ensuring that international trade in fauna and flora doesn’t threaten their survival in the wild - and high volumes of illegal wildlife trade (IWT) in most CITES-listed species still take place globally. As a result, only around one-third of the approximately 41,000 species protected under CITES, are currently showing stable or improving population statuses. At the same time, the rest have experienced a steady decline in their conservation status, from near threatened to critically endangered. Most continue to decline due to illegal and unreported trade, human-induced factors such as habitat degradation, climate change and limited enforcement capacity. Essentially, this is a consequence of CITES not being a binding treaty, with no legal implications for non-compliance by member countries, and of its limited purview to legal trade in wildlife and wildlife derivatives. Signatory countries, called parties, are unilaterally and solely responsible for monitoring and reporting trade, enforcing penalties for illicit trade in their territories, and cooperating internationally to curb IWT.
Currently, the vast majority of hunting and global wildlife trade is illicit, estimated to be worth up to US$ 35 billion annually and involving over 100 million plants and animals every year, driven by the burgeoning demand for wildlife as food, products, and pets. The illegal wildlife trade facilitates zoonotic spill overs between wildlife and humans, the introduction of invasive alien species with consequences for native biodiversity, climate change, land degradation and severe biodiversity loss and extinction risk. The United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) estimates that 75 per cent of all emerging diseases are transmitted to humans through animals, and that this spillover rate is accelerated by habitat destruction and facilitated by IWT. The outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic and the emergence of other well-known diseases circulating in wildlife, such as Ebola and SARS, have revealed the enormous dangers posed by zoonotic disease outbreaks that can be caused by illicit wildlife trade. However, despite the grave consequences of wildlife trade, the heightened focus on conservation and sustainability over the past few decades, and the decades of work by multilateral environmental conventions such as CITES, IWT continues to increase globally, driving species to extinction and causing novel zoonotic spillovers.
In India, the Wild Life (Protection) Act of 1972 and its latest amendment in 2022 is the overarching legislation that prohibits all forms of hunting and trade of animals listed in Schedules I-IV, covering approximately 2,600 species of mammals, birds, herpetofauna, fish and invertebrates, as well as species listed in the various CITES Appendices for protection from illicit international trade. However, a variety of wildlife species have been hunted and consumed historically in India, mainly for subsistence, and partly for cultural habits and medicinal purposes. Even now, the majority of hunting and wildlife trade in India is domestic, predominantly driven by demand for wild meat, traditional medicine, and fuelled by sociocultural factors, myths and religious beliefs, and, to some extent, monetary factors. In India’s biodiversity-rich forest landscapes, such as the Himalayas and the Eastern and Western Ghats, hunting and illegal trade in wildlife and its derivatives to meet this demand are causing widespread population declines and local extinctions of threatened species, including big cats, pangolins, deer, and bears. Body parts, organs such as gallbladders, skin, pelts and furs, ivory, horns, claws, and scales of pangolins, cats, antelopes, deer, bears, primates, elephants, rhinos, and reptiles such as monitor lizards, freshwater turtles, and tortoises are consumed either whole or in powdered form. Products made from wildlife are also consumed, worn as rings, necklaces, or amulets as symbols of good luck charms, used in black magic, or purportedly to avoid danger, and used in preparing bags, apparel, boots, or medicinal instruments. Traditional cultural practices, such as the use of gaur horns for ritual dances by indigenous communities of the Eastern Ghats and central India, are a major driver of hunting. The belief in the effectiveness of herbal medicines has led to an increase in the illegal harvesting of medicinal plants. Capture of live animals, particularly primates, reptiles and birds for display in road shows across India, and for pets, has been a significant factor in depleting populations of several species. Several forms of folk medicine in India use wildlife products to treat a variety of medical ailments, ranging from diabetes, hypertension, piles, and infertility. In particular, severely threatened species like lorises, pangolins, and owls are hunted by communities because of their belief in black magic. On the other hand, species such as pangolins, monitor lizards, and some bats are widely regarded as delicacies or luxury foods. Rarer species often become more lucrative, fetching much higher prices in the illicit trade, further fuelling their poaching - known in scientific parlance as the Anthropogenic Allee Effect - and thereby hastening their extinction and accelerating a biodiversity crisis. In recent decades, India has also emerged as a major destination country and consumer for exotic animals and plants, including primates such as spider monkeys, capuchins, lorises, pythons, rare birds and plants such as orchids.
Curbing hunting, wildlife trade and the consumption of wild meat in India is crucial for conserving our biodiversity. However, this requires fundamental behavioural shifts and cultural transformations across large sections of our population. Hunting and wildlife trade is multifaceted, driven by complex sociocultural, economic and behavioural drivers, and therefore cannot be mitigated by enforcement alone. Efforts to incentivise this shift should begin by understanding the diverse range of drivers of wildlife consumption and by addressing deeply held traditional, cultural notions of communities and of human behaviour driving hunting. Reliance on regulation and legislative instruments, such as multilateral treaties like CITES, which rely chiefly on compliance by individual member states, will therefore not be effective to save India’s wildlife from hunting and illegal trade. An integrative approach, combining intensive research efforts on sociocultural norms, consumers’ preferences and cultural practices driving hunting, is essential to address the illegal wildlife trade. Recognising traditional knowledge and use of wildlife of various communities in India and providing alternative livelihoods to reduce dependence on illicit hunting, is an essential prerequisite to alleviating hunting pressure. Communicating the serious health risks of consuming wildlife, particularly among the vulnerable and often marginalised forest-dwelling communities, who are usually the first rungs in the chain of illegal trade, can deter people from hunting. Cultural beliefs and hunting taboos have been known to reduce demand for particular species in certain geographies, and emphasising the significance of these beliefs can help discourage hunting.
Vikram Aditya is principal scientist and faculty at the Centre for Wildlife Studies, Bengaluru
Yogesh Pasul is project coordinator at the Centre for Wildlife Studies, Bengaluru
Views expressed are the authors’ own and don’t necessarily reflect those of Down To Earth