IUCN / SSC Cat Specialist Group - Digital Cat Library |
|
||||||||||
|
||||||||||
|
|
| Waterland, S.; Vaughan, J.; Lyman, E.; Jurisic, I. | |
| Illegal wildlife trade review Malawi, May 2015 | |
| 2015 Full Book | |
An exponential increase in the scale and nature of the Illegal Wildlife Trade (IWT) globally has left governments, policy makers and conservationists lagging far behind the perpetrators of the crime. In many countries, criminals are shipping enormous quantities of high value products such as ivory, rhino horn and pangolin scales largely untouched by ineffective enforcement efforts. Given significant black market prices for wildlife products, and woeful detection and prosecution rates for wildlife offences, it is not surprising that organised crime networks have turned their attention to IWT. The rewards for wildlife crime, in most cases, far exceed the risks. This situation is true in Malawi, as with several other countries. However, Malawi for a long time has remained largely under the radar of those trying to combat IWT, due to its small size and relatively small numbers of wildlife. This Review of Illegal Wildlife Trade in Malawi used the ICCWC Wildlife and Forest Crime Analytic Toolkit to analyse wildlife crime data, wildlife legislation, enforcement capacity and agencies, judiciary and prosecution services and the drivers of wildlife crime. The findings are comprehensive and show that although Malawi is setting some excellent examples and making some crucial progressive steps - e.g. being signatory to several wildlife conservation Agreements and Declarations and establishing an Inter-Agency Committee on Combating Wildlife Crime (IACCWC) - there is still a long way to go and a lot of work to be done if Malawi is to effectively combat IWT and rid itself of wildlife criminals. |
|
 |
PDF files are only accessible to Friends of the Cat Group. Joining Friends of the Cat Group gives you unlimited access and downloads in the Cat SG Library for one year, and allows you to receive our newsletter Cat News (2 regular issues per year plus special issues). More information how to join here |
(c) IUCN/SSC Cat Specialist Group ( IUCN - The World Conservation Union) |