{"id":1705,"date":"2014-08-18T14:26:59","date_gmt":"2014-08-18T04:26:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/theveterinarian.com.au\/?p=1705"},"modified":"2014-09-01T11:43:59","modified_gmt":"2014-09-01T01:43:59","slug":"china-moves-to-stop-illegal-wildlife-trade","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/theveterinarian.com.au\/?p=1705","title":{"rendered":"China moves to stop illegal wildlife trade"},"content":{"rendered":"Two resolutions introduced recently in China provide further indications government and corporate authorities there are committed to doing more to stop the trade in illegal wildlife.<\/span>\r\n\r\n Towards the end of April China\u2019s top legislative authority, the Standing Committee of the National People\u2019s Congress approved a reinterpretation of the country\u2019s criminal law. Whereas harsh fines and prison sentences could previously be given to those involved in illegal wildlife trafficking, the law was less clear cut for those caught eating illegally-caught animals. Now however, people who knowingly buy or consume rare wild animals are considered to have committed a criminal offence, and any violation could see people serving prison sentences ranging from three years to over a decade.<\/span>\r\n\r\n Giant pandas, golden monkeys, Asian black bears, and the slow-moving anteaters called pangolins are among the 420 animal species the Chinese government considers to be rare or endangered. <\/span>\r\n\r\n The increased wealth for many Chinese is understood to be behind the expansion of the illegal trade in animal products, which command high prices as important status symbols, but according to the deputy head of the Legislative Affairs Commission of the NPC Lang Sheng, this desirability is also the principal reason why illegal hunting has continued, despite repeated crackdowns.<\/span>\r\n\r\n \u201cIn fact, buyers are a major motivator of large-scale illegal hunting,\u201d he said.<\/span>\r\n\r\n The Asia regional director for the International Fund for Animal Welfare, Grace Gabriel was more upbeat about the law\u2019s clarification, describing it as \u2018very, very encouraging\u2019.<\/span>\r\n\r\n \u201cIncluding wildlife consumption in the criminal law can play a very important part in curtailing, and also stigmatising, wildlife consumption,\u201d she said.<\/span>\r\n\r\n<\/a> It is a view supported by those in China\u2019s business community, which is also being encouraged to place a greater value on endangered wildlife. In a project jointly undertaken with wildlife conservation network TRAFFIC, and launched during June by senior executive and businessman Ni Dayong, key business executives from Beijing are being encouraged to promote a guide dubbed <\/span>Good for business, great for wildlife worldwide <\/i><\/span>that is designed to reduce the Chinese practice of corporate gifting of wildlife products. It is an approach that uses a combination of greater awareness of changing attitudes towards such gifts, government commitment to ending the illegal wildlife trade, and showcasing how companies can help make a difference by choosing not to make such gifts.<\/span>\r\n\r\n \u201cThe environment and wildlife are very important to us, but we didn\u2019t treat them well in the past. As a businessman I would like to make a commitment not to consume wildlife products and call for all within my circles to cherish wildlife,\u201d Ni Dayong said.<\/span>\r\n\r\n Support for the program was also given by China\u2019s e-commerce powerhouse Alibaba, a company that has \u2018pursued the fight against illegal wildlife trade since being established through our work with organisations like TRAFFIC and WWF\u2019. Ni Liang, senior director of Alibaba\u2019s security department said messages that aimed to influence both consumer behaviour, and raise awareness among staff about potential conservation impacts of trade in wild plant and mammal species, had already been issued.<\/span>\r\n\r\n \u201cWe will call on our peers in other e-commerce companies, our users and colleagues to reduce demand for illegal wildlife products. We will set a good example – be a good model,\u201d he said.<\/span>\r\n\r\n \r\n\r\nAnne Layton-Bennett<\/b><\/span>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Two resolutions introduced recently in China provide further indications government and corporate authorities there are committed to doing more to stop the trade in illegal wildlife. Towards the end of April China\u2019s top legislative authority, the Standing Committee of the National People\u2019s Congress approved a reinterpretation of the country\u2019s criminal law. Whereas harsh fines and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[31,1537,113,1538,1236],"class_list":["post-1705","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-china","tag-detector-dogs","tag-news-2","tag-ruili-drug-detector-dog-base","tag-wildlife-trade"],"rise-blocks_total_comments":1,"rise-blocks_categories":[{"term_id":5,"name":"News","slug":"news","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":5,"taxonomy":"category","description":"","parent":0,"count":403,"filter":"raw","cat_ID":5,"category_count":403,"category_description":"","cat_name":"News","category_nicename":"news","category_parent":0}],"rise-blocks_excerpt":"Two resolutions introduced recently in China provide further indications government and corporate authorities there are committed to doing more to stop the trade in illegal wildlife. Towards the end of April China\u2019s top legislative authority, the Standing Committee of the National People\u2019s Congress approved a reinterpretation of the country\u2019s criminal law. Whereas harsh fines and prison sentences could previously be..","blog_post_layout_featured_media_urls":{"thumbnail":"","full":""},"categories_names":{"5":{"name":"News","link":"https:\/\/theveterinarian.com.au\/?cat=5"}},"tags_names":{"31":{"name":"China","link":"https:\/\/theveterinarian.com.au\/?tag=china"},"1537":{"name":"detector dogs","link":"https:\/\/theveterinarian.com.au\/?tag=detector-dogs"},"113":{"name":"news","link":"https:\/\/theveterinarian.com.au\/?tag=news-2"},"1538":{"name":"Ruili Drug Detector Dog Base","link":"https:\/\/theveterinarian.com.au\/?tag=ruili-drug-detector-dog-base"},"1236":{"name":"wildlife trade","link":"https:\/\/theveterinarian.com.au\/?tag=wildlife-trade"}},"comments_number":"1","wpmagazine_modules_lite_featured_media_urls":{"thumbnail":"","cvmm-medium":"","cvmm-medium-plus":"","cvmm-portrait":"","cvmm-medium-square":"","cvmm-large":"","cvmm-small":"","full":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/theveterinarian.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1705","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/theveterinarian.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/theveterinarian.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theveterinarian.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theveterinarian.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1705"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/theveterinarian.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1705\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1789,"href":"https:\/\/theveterinarian.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1705\/revisions\/1789"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/theveterinarian.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1705"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theveterinarian.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1705"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theveterinarian.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1705"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}