Control of Internet Wildlife Trade
in China
The rise of the Internet has revolutionized
the way ideas, information and merchandise are exchanged. This
is largely due to the Internet’s ability to facilitate communication
and foster new commercial partnerships and social relationships
around the globe. However, the Internet also provides an unprecedented
platform for conducting undocumented trade in wildlife, making
it one of the major wildlife conservation challenges of our
generation. The number of Internet users is growing rapidly
in China. A survey released by the China Internet Network Information
Center (CNNIC) shows that, by the end of June 2009, China
had the world’s largest population of Internet users,
with 338 million users. Among these, 87.9 million
are online shoppers. This number has continued to increase
rapidly, even during the recent economic recession.
eBay Eachnet used to be the biggest auction site in
China, with more than 10 million users, but its market
share has dropped gradually since 2004 with the launch of
another Web-based auction site, Taobao. In 2007, eBay Eachnet
closed its main auction site in mainland China and entered
into a joint venture to create Tom Eachnet (www.eachnet.com). Taobao
(www.taobao.com) occupies
most of the market. It is a subsidiary company of China’s
largest e-commerce platform (www.alibaba.com),
which claimed to have more than 240 million users from
200 countries in 2007. Its transactions exceeded CNY 1,690 million
in the same year. Paipai (www.paipai.com) is the second largest
e-commerce platform, and Tom Eachnet the third.
During a two-week period in 2004, the International Fund for
Animal Welfare (IFAW) found over 1,390 ivory items on major
Chinese-language auction sites. Based on these findings, the
CITES Management Authority of China (CNMA) called in 2005 for
a ban on the trade in ivory via the Internet. Additionally,
the Ministry of Public Security of China (MPS) urged the major
auction sites to remove ivory items and raise awareness among
their registered users.
However, in another two-week period in 2006, IFAW found 835
items of ivory for sale on the Internet. This investigation
found many new names for the word “ivory” used
by traders to evade monitoring and the law. Following this
investigation, Taobao and eBay responded to government requests
and decided to ban and remove all ivory products from their
websites.
In 2007, a year-long online random check of the four major
e-commerce sites was conducted for CITES Appendix-I listed
and/or State Class-I protected species. Although all of the
monitored websites have imposed a ban on ivory and a “no
endangered species and their products” policy, a total
of 1,973 wildlife products from over 30 species were
found on these websites, 75 % of which were ivory products.
Furthermore, many other endangered species were for sale on
these websites. Wildlife items found to be illegally traded
via the Internet were from over 30 locations, the majority
of which were large cities and provinces such as Beijing, Guangzhou,
Shanghai and Jiangsu Province. This geographical profile correlates
with investigations made in the local markets located in those
cities and provinces.
Many traders of illegal wildlife items are obviously aware
that selling such items on the Internet is a violation of the
law. As a result, they disguise the illegal items by using
nicknames or incorrect spelling, or by advertizing the items
as 'ersatz' or 'imitation' while certifying their authenticity
in their detailed description. Sellers based in other countries
were also responsible for posting advertisements for wildlife
products on Chinese web auction sites. Finally, it was also
found that wildlife products smuggled from overseas were sold
on Chinese Web auction sites.
To further reduce illegal trade in wildlife via the Internet,
CNMA and MPS co-organized a workshop on Control of Internet
Wildlife Trade in January 2008. Thirty participants from all
concerned government law enforcement and wildlife management
agencies, four major websites, IFAW and TRAFFIC attended. Law
enforcement actions were taken afterwards. All participants
from Web auction websites contributed to the keyword pool the
names/terms sellers used to evade inspection in an effort to
enhance screening. Both Eachnet and Paipai removed all reported
wildlife products. Finally, more than 80 % of wildlife
items identified by IFAW were deleted from the Web auction
sites.
Many cases related to illegal online wildlife trade have been
handled by wildlife enforcement agencies. For example, in 2008
and 2009, the Shenyang Forest Police Bureau of China’s
Liaoning province detected three wildlife cases and arrested
four suspects involved in online trade in wildlife.
In addition to investments in efforts to eliminate illegal
trade in wildlife products on the Internet, it is also crucial
to educate online shoppers to not trade in endangered wildlife
species. On 20 November 2008, in Beijing, Taobao and IFAW
launched a month-long campaign to raise consumer awareness
about illegal trade of wildlife on the Internet and to reject
online trade in animals and their products. On Taobao, IFAW
opened an e-store to collect information from Taobao users
about wildlife crime. The event was endorsed by and counted
on the participation of CNMA and the Forestry Police Agency.
During this month, Taobao received more than 3,900 reports
of illegal wildlife product sale on its website, an amount
four times the number received in the month prior to the campaign.
Taobao users and website visitors can also acquire knowledge
of wildlife conservation, CITES and relevant laws and regulations
by visiting IFAW’s online “store” and education
webpage on Taobao. Moreover, as part of this collaboration,
Taobao announced the ban of shark fin products on its website
and asked its online traders to remove all fin products by
1 January 2009.
Similar to Taobao, Alibaba International, the largest B2B
(business-to-business) e-commerce website in the world, also
banned trade in shark fins in October 2009. In addition, Alibaba
has enhanced its internal control of trade in wildlife products
to meet international and national regulations. With IFAW’s
support, 333 wildlife product advertisements and five registered
traders from Canada, Cameroon and the United States have been
removed from the Alibaba website, and many new keywords have
been added to its control filter system.
As a result of the joint effort among government agencies,
websites, NGOs and the public, illegal trade in wildlife on
Chinese e-commerce websites has been greatly reduced. However,
we have found that illegal trade in wildlife conducted on art
and craft collection websites and specialized forums has increased.
These websites and forums suffer from a lack of internal control
and regulations, which creates blind spots in enforcement.
Many traders who originally used the auction websites have
moved their business to these uncontrolled websites and specialized
forums. This new trend sets new challenges for enforcement
agencies.
Given the scale of trade, the speed and geographic span of
Web transactions and the anonymity of the Internet, the Internet
is posing a huge challenge to governments and law enforcement
agencies. It clearly continues to facilitate significant trade
in wildlife worldwide without immediate and coordinated action
from all key actors.
All Parties to the Convention need to evaluate or develop
CITES implementing legislation and regulations sufficient to
address the challenges of controlling trade in wildlife via
the Internet. It is also necessary to establish a mechanism
to coordinate, at the national level, the monitoring of Internet-related
wildlife trade and the sharing of monitoring result with CITES
Management and Enforcement Authorities. Enforcement Authoritiesneed
to allocate sufficient resources to the investigation and targeting
of illegal Internet-related trade in specimens of CITES-listed
species and to participate in furthering international cooperation
to better tackle illegal trade in wildlife on the Internet.
Owners of auction websites also need to take responsibility
for illegal trade in protected species occurring on their websites
and to take measures to monitor, delete and report any suspicious
items listed. They should also educate website users. Non-governmental
organizations can help with monitoring and reporting illegal
wildlife trade on the Internet and with raising public awareness.
The public should report suspicious advertisements on the Internet
and reject the purchase of illegal wildlife products.
Mr. Ziming WAN
Director
Enforcement and Training Division
Endangered Species Ipm. & Exp. Administrative Office
State Forestry Administration
18 Hepingli East Street
Beijing 100714
China
Tel: +8610 84239004
Fax: +8610 84238894
E-mail: ziming_wan@163.com, wan.ziming@gmail.com |
