Combating the Illegal Trade in African Elephant Ivory with DNA Forensics

Conservation Biology - Tập 22 Số 4 - Trang 1065-1071 - 2008
Samuel K. Wasser1, William Clark2, Ofir Drori3, Emily Kisamo4, Celia Mailand1, Benezeth Mutayoba5, Matthew Stephens6
1Center for Conservation Biology, Department of Biology, University of Washington, Seattle, WA 98195‐1800, U.S.A.
2Interpol Working Group on Wildlife Crime and Department of Law Enforcement, Israel Nature and Parks Authority, Jerusalem 95463, Israel
3Last Great Ape Organization, Vallee Nlongkak, Younde, Cameroon
4Lusaka Agreement Task Force, P.O. Box 3533, Nairobi, Kenya
5Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, Sokoine University of Agriculture, Morogoro, Tanzania
6Department of Human Genetics and Statistics, University of Chicago, Chicago, IL 60637, U.S.A.

Tóm tắt

Abstract:  International wildlife crime is burgeoning in this climate of global trade. We contend that the most effective way to contain this illegal trade is to determine where the wildlife is being removed. This allows authorities to direct law enforcement to poaching hot spots, potentially stops trade before the wildlife is actually killed, prevents countries from denying their poaching problems at home, and thwarts trade before it enters into an increasingly complex web of international criminal activity. Forensic tools have been limited in their ability to determine product origin because the information they can provide typically begins only at the point of shipment. DNA assignment analyses can determine product origin, but its use has been limited by the inability to assign samples to locations where reference samples do not exist. We applied new DNA assignment methods that can determine the geographic origin(s) of wildlife products from anywhere within its range. We used these methods to examine the geographic origin(s) of 2 strings of seizures involving large volumes of elephant ivory, 1 string seized in Singapore and Malawi and the other in Hong Kong and Cameroon. These ivory traffickers may comprise 2 of the largest poaching rings in Africa. In both cases all ivory seized in the string had common origins, which indicates that crime syndicates are targeting specific populations for intense exploitation. This result contradicts the dominant belief that dealers are using a decentralized plan of procuring ivory stocks as they became available across Africa. Large quantities of ivory were then moved, in multiple shipments, through an intermediate country prior to shipment to Asia, as a risk‐reduction strategy that distances the dealer from the poaching locale. These smuggling strategies could not have been detected by forensic information, which typically begins only at the shipping source.

Từ khóa


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Thông tin
Thông tin xuất bản

Conservation Biology

Tập 22 Số 4

1065-1071

Thông tin tác giả