Last year, WildAid reported that an estimated 150,000 manta and mobula rays were killed in 2013 so their gill rakers could be sold as part of a growing trade, mostly at the markets of Guangzhou, China.
Known as peng yu sai, the gill rakers — cartilage filaments used to filter food from the water column — are not part of Traditional Chinese Medicine, but they are used in the preparation of a soup-like "health tonic." Merchants advertise a wide range of unproven health benefits and claim that peng yu sai can treat everything from skin rashes to cancer.
As The Duke of Cambridge tours China this week — the first such visit by a senior member of the British Royal Family since the 1980s — WildAid and its partners are spreading the word for elephants and rhinos with public service announcements starring His Royal Highness across the country.
SAN FRANCISCO (March 3, 2015) — Chinese consumer awareness of the ivory and rhino horn trade’s devastating impact on African wildlife has grown rapidly over the past two years, the result of major public awareness campaigns by wildlife organizations and state media, according to two new reports from WildAid, the African Wildlife Foundation and Save the Elephants as part of their joint campaigns in China.
Join WildAid and the U.S. Department of State on Tuesday, March 3 @ 9:00am ET for a Google+ Hangout to celebrate #WorldWildlifeDay. Under Secretary of State Catherine Novelli will discuss wildlife trafficking and other issues with experts from the NGO community, including WildAid CEO Peter Knights.
On Thursday, the Chinese governmental agency that oversees the nation’s wildlife trade announced a one-year ban on African ivory carving imports, effective immediately. Though the brief statement was posted online without fanfare, it sparked a global conversation as to what it means and how it could impact the ivory trade. Read more ...
HONG KONG — In a significant boost for Africa’s elephants, leaders of Hong Kong’s largest political party have announced plans to push for a commercial ivory ban in China.
On Monday, five lawmakers from the Democratic Alliance for the Betterment and Progress of Hong Kong (DAB) announced at the party’s annual Chinese New Year press conference that they would submit a recommendations to ban the domestic sale and transportation of elephant ivory in China for discussion in Beijing next month, when officials will convene for annual plenary sessions of the National People’s Congress and the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference. Read more...
Photo: 52 prominent religious leaders attend an interfaith workshop for wildlife hosted by WildAid in Tanzania on February 11. Courtesy Salome Gasabile
Whether Thandi and her new calf will be enduring symbols of survival or merely a blip of good news in the tragic war against brutal rhino poaching has yet to be seen. Despite hundreds of South African National Defence Force troops and sophisticated drone technology being deployed to intercept poachers in South Africa’s parks, numbers of dead rhino continue to increase. A record 1,215 rhinos were illegally killed in that country last year, up from 1,004 in 2013 and 668 in 2012. The high prices paid for rhino horn on black markets in China and Vietnam are financing corruption and sophisticated international criminal networks that are very difficult to defeat as we have in the “war on drugs.”
A precipitous spike in rhino and elephant poaching has dominated environmental news headlines in recent weeks, with record numbers of rhinos killed in South Africa last year and sting operations in multiple African nations uncovering elephant ivory bound for Asian markets.
But look closer at the coverage, and you may also read about one obscure animal equally imperiled by the illegal wildlife trade — and a fraction the physical size of these megafauna.
and its partners:
