A Meal Worth Extinction? Pangolin Species Poached to the Brink of Extinction as Asian Aphrodisiac
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As international poaching syndicates continue to thrive, illegally hunting animals for bones and meat considered as aphrodisiacs or ornamental, eight species of anteater relatives known as "pangolins" are being driven to extinction. Literally being eaten out of existence, current research shows that these Asian scaled mammals are being decimated, even in spite of recent trade bans and laws that are intended to discourage their deaths under threat of incarceration.
The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Species Survival Commissions' pangolin specialty group, which is run by the Zoological Society of London, reports that with more than one million pangolins poached from the wild in the past decade, pangolin species are now "the most illegally traded mammal in the world". And as the Southeast Asian black-market remains strong, trade of pangolins may lead to the extinction of up to all eight native species.
Pangolins are mammals closely related to the anteater, but more like their cousins the armadillo, pangolins are covered in closely overlapping scales mad of keratin, much like that of human fingernails. Considered to be a delicacy, and to have medicinal properties in traditional Chinese medicine, poachers harvest pangolin hides and meats for marginal profits because they are easy to acquire. When threatened, pangolins curl up into a ball, allowing for their outer scales to help defend them from predatory animals. A successful defense mechanism against tigers and other natural predators, the mechanism makes them easy prey for poachers, who can easily bundle the pangolins up into sacks while they're curled up.
"[Currently] all eight pangolin species are now listed as threatened with extinction, largely because they are being illegally traded to China and Vietnam" Conservation Programmes Director at the Zoological Society of London, Jonathan Baillie says. "In the 21st Century we should not be eating species to extinction - there is simply no excuse for allowing this illegal trade to continue."
Throughout all of Asia, a commercial trade ban for wild-caught pangolins has attempted to end the trade in the Far East. Some countries such as China, have implemented strict legal frameworks that outlaw the consumption of rare wild animal species, with up to ten years in prison as punishment for dining on an endangered meal. However, as Asian consumers are willing to pay inflated prices for the black-market species, population densities for pangolins continue to drop drastically.
In fact, as four Asian pangolin species approach extinction due to the persistent trade, traders have now turned to poachers in Africa to meet the growing demand. Although, as with all conservation efforts, the survival of the eight species cannot be simply ensured with legal measures or threat of incarceration, researchers and conservationists are looking to hold nations accountable for the illegal international trade, and create a transnational framework that will help combat continued poaching and consumption of these rare mammals.
"Our global strategy to halt the decline of the world's pangolins needs to be urgently implemented" Co-Chair of the IUCN Species Survival Commissions' pangolin specialty group, Dan Challender says. "A vital first step is for the Chinese and Vietnamese governments to conduct an inventory of their pangolin scale stocks, and make this publicly available to prove that wild-caught pangolins are no longer supplying the commercial trade."
