The Tasmanian Tiger was never a tiger. Rather, it was a dog-like creature, and as befits an Australian animal, it was a marsupial, with a pouch. It derived its name from the distinctive tiger-like stripes that crossed its rear half.
But in any case, it is no more, another victim of mankind’s ever increasing capacity to shape – and damage – the Earth. Species are now becoming extinct in alarming numbers, way in excess of what would be occurring without the intervention of humans. One more species will have gone for ever by the time you finish reading this article.
Add your voice! Urge U.S. Congress to protect big cats in captivity! #USBigCats https://t.co/ICaKFhq9PN pic.twitter.com/roSs2bCiBY
— IFAW (@action4ifaw) September 13, 2016
Sometimes plentiful species, which have existed for many thousands of years, vanish almost overnight. The passenger pigeon was once North America’s most common bird, darkening the skies with its huge flocks. At one point the population reached 5 billion. The taste of the bird was prized, and hunting saw it off with a rapid decline in numbers from 1870, with the last wild bird shot in 1900, and the last captive specimen dying in 1914.
And it was hunting that finished off the Tasmanian tiger as well, over a period not much longer. When the danger of extinction was formally recognised in 1901, hunters scrambled to shoot what was left before they lost their chance. Meanwhile official protection of the species by the Tasmanian government was introduced only on 10 July 1936, uselessly 59 days before the last known specimen died in captivity.
In 2016, chasing endangered species to extinction has become professional and brutal big business. Rare species and parts from them command big money and now constitute the third largest illegal trade in the world, behind only drugs and arms.
Although encouraging that Germany caught it, a seizure of this magnitude is very disturbing. https://t.co/9M8njW7J6v pic.twitter.com/F4MbdDCt5U
— IFAW (@action4ifaw) September 12, 2016
The size of the trade is staggering. Tigers, the real ones, which numbered around 100,000 in 1900, now have fewer specimens in the wild than in captivity in the United States. Central Africa has lost 64% of its elephants in just a decade. And every year 73 million, yes million, sharks are slaughtered for their fins.
While a minister at the Home Office in London, I took a good deal of interest in the work of the UK’s National Wildlife Crime Unit, and indeed visited their operation at Heathrow where were housed an eclectic collection of endangered species, seized by the Unit while in transit through the UK. The unit does a great job, but I fear the main consequence of that is not to curtail the trade, but to reroute it through less fastidious airports.
I also co-hosted a very encouraging international summit in London in 2014, where 41 countries signed a declaration, committing all sides to action. Having heard the evidence they could not really do anything else.
Countries call to end domestic ivory sales as elephants disappear #IUCNCongress https://t.co/em5V3oKEAp on @mashable pic.twitter.com/ZOgYfB4P3k
— IFAW (@action4ifaw) September 12, 2016
The poachers in Africa are not lone mavericks, toting a rifle. All too frequently they arrive in large numbers in military helicopters, and machine gun everything in sight when they touch down, including any rangers unfortunate enough to be in the area.
With many countries that house endangered species having vast land areas and with little in the way of resource, it is an uphill struggle to thwart the poachers. Promoting a tourist trade helps, so that local people can benefit from non-lethal safaris and so have a reason to protect the animals. And rich countries like the US and UK can do more to provide finance to help well-meaning governments bolster their anti-poaching activities. I heard at the summit that sometimes just the provision of 4-wheel drive vehicles can be a big help.
But the real answer is to cut off the demand for the smuggled goods. Sometimes these are supplied to order for irresponsible collectors in rich countries, who want live trophy species, often with no idea how to provide a suitable environment for them.
.@JapanGov & @environmentza introduce 15 amendments to Motion 007 in effort to derail ivory ban @ #IUCNCongress. pic.twitter.com/TXDMhGjLUL
— Dr. Kehaulani Watson (@hehawaiiau) September 10, 2016
Much the biggest problem, though, comes from countries like China, where products like rhino horn and ivory are valued in medicine. The tragic irony is that the rhinos and elephants are paying for their lives for no purpose. Such medicine is quack medicine, with rhino horn and ivory little different in constitution to human fingernails.
Furthermore, China allows a legal trade in ivory and rhino horn that provides cover for poachers and stimulates further wildlife crime.
Sadly, the internet has magnified the problem. In six weeks in 2014, the campaign group International Fund for Animal Welfare found 33,006 illegal animal products from the list of those species most endangered across 280 online marketplaces in 16 countries, in 9,482 advertisements. The estimated value to the criminal was in excess of $10m.
The world needs to come together to better protect animals in their natural habitats, and choke off demand for those animals. Time is running out. Do we really want our children and grandchildren to grow up in a world where the rhino joins the passenger pigeon in extinction, and the glorious tiger goes the way of the Tasmanian tiger?
- Norman Baker was a UK minister from 2010 to 2014.
