Illegal Tiger Trade | 22 Aug 2019

• Recently a new report titled ‘Skin and Bones Unresolved: An Analysis of Tiger Seizures from 2000-2018’ compiled by TRAFFIC, in partnership with the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) and the International Union for Conservation of Nature has quantified the illegal global trade in tigers and tiger parts over a 19-year period between 2000 and 2018.
• It was the fourth in a series on tiger trade by TRAFFIC, a wildlife trade monitoring network headquartered in the United Kingdom.

Findings of Report

• India is the country with the highest number of seizure incidents (463, or 40% of all seizures) as well as tigers seized (625).
  
  • The TRAFFIC report uses the 2016 WWF estimate of 2,226 tigers in India. It is home to more than 56% of the global wild tiger population.
  • India has the world’s largest tiger population — 2,967 in the Tiger Census released in July, 2019.
• India is the country with the highest number of seizure incidents (463, or 40% of all seizures) as well as tigers seized (625). In terms of various body parts seized, India had the highest share among countries for tiger skins (38%), bones (28%) and claws and teeth (42%).
• The top three countries with the highest number of seizure incidents were India (463 or 40.5% of total seizures) and China (126 or 11.0%), closely followed by Indonesia (119 or 10.5%).

Source: IE