Heart of darkness

Heart of darkness

Poachers kill rare white giraffes, compounding a global health and environment challenge.

The sighting of a white giraffe and her calf made headlines across the continents in 2017. Even now, videos of these noble long-necked and long-legged creatures peaceably ambling in Kenyan flora give new meaning to the phrase ‘she walks in beauty’. Last year the mother brought another pale baby giraffe into the world. Now the family is down to one. Poachers have killed the eldest and youngest.

Illegal wildlife trade is estimated to be the fourth largest illegal activity globally – after drugs, people smuggling and counterfeiting. It is a big contributor to the collapsing biodiversity that scientists are calling Earth’s sixth mass extinction. Less biodiverse forests are more vulnerable to climate disturbances too. As if all this was not reason enough to end poaching, the Covid-19 pandemic has served fresh evidence of the human health dangers of the global trade in wildlife. This is now a public safety issue. And the scale of the challenge should not be underestimated. Just a single shop in the Wuhan market that proved to be ground zero for the novel coronavirus, advertised the feet, blood, intestines and other body parts of over 70 species.

It will take people to save the animals. Experience in India and other countries has shown that the most upmarket interventions inside wildlife reserves are no substitute for the cooperation of communities around them. Local citizens need to be stakeholders in conservation. They need to have skin in the game. At the other end patterns of consumption need to change, even where they have deep traditional roots. On a discouraging note, while China has now banned trade in certain wildlife, what exotica can still be eaten appears to be a trending concern on social media. Are bullfrogs still available? How about bear paws?