The animal smugglers - Techknow
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- Опубликовано: 29 окт 2016
- The smuggling of endangered wildlife, both dead and alive, is a billion dollar global business, second only in size to the illegal arms and drug trades. American border control continues to see an incessant attempt at bringing hundreds of species into the United States every year - each attempt more creative than the next.
Chatuchak market in Bangkok is one of the largest open air flea markets in Thailand, attracting locals and tourists alike. It boasts over 8,000 vendors selling every type of good under the sun: ceramics, antiques, furniture, clothing and endangered animals. Chatachuk has been recognised by the World Wildlife Fund as a hot spot for illegal animal trade.
"It's really disturbing actually - there's no telling what you're going to find," says Joseph Johns, prosecutor of environmental crimes at the US Attorney's office in Los Angeles, of Chatachuk. "You couldn't do this anywhere in the United States of America."
People do ask me, 'what's the strangest animal you've ever seen?' and I'll tell them, 'it's man'.
Mike Osborn, supervisor, US Fish and Wildlife Service
The market is a tragically perfect place to sell and buy illegal wildlife. It is a bustling scene with hoards of people, perfect cover for a potential deal. Vendors can hide their illegal animals behind domestic pet storefronts. Thailand itself serves as a major funnel for the $10 billion illegal wildlife trade. There is a good chance that what is sold in Chatuchak might find it's way back to the United States.
The black market for the animal trade is unsurprisingly nondiscriminatory - live crocodiles, overharvested Queen conch shells, and even rare orchids and other flora have also made their way across patrolled borders.
"I've had monkeys jump out of suitcases, birds flying out of toothpaste boxes... they get more and more intricate nowadays," says Mike Osborn, supervisor with the US Fish and Wildlife Service.
In some cases, the attempts to smuggle have been so desperate, the methods have matched the desire to make business. In Los Angeles, Jereme James was caught smuggling three Fiji island banded iguanas from a nature preserve - whilst on honeymoon - and attempting to sell them to an undercover US Fish and Wildlife Service agent. James admitted to smuggling the iguanas by creating a special compartment in his prosthetic leg.
As with many other animals seized at the border, the iguanas in question were rescued by a zoo, in this case, the San Diego Zoo Reptile House. According to zoo curator Kim Lovich, most seized animals live out their days in captivity; it can be very difficult to return an animal back to its home without full knowledge of its original habitat.
"If you don't know exactly where that animal is from, you could be introducing viruses to a naive population," says Lovich.
The species themselves are selected for a range of values. Some for their rare and exotic qualities, like an ivory totem or a python wallet. Others are captured and sold for pseudo-medicinal purposes, such as the bladder from the Totoaba, a critically endangered sea bass that can only be found in Mexico's Sea of Cortez. The demand for this specific organ is coming from over 8,000 miles aay in Asia due to the belief that the bladder can improve circulation, skin vitality and boost fertility. One bladder can sell for $15,000 on the black market.
Undercover agents are doing what they can to intercept the sale of trafficked goods, but the major driver of this falls on the public and the escalating demand for exotic animals. An economic boom, superstition, celebrity, and dubious medicinal claims are all playing a role, encouraging conspicuous consumption in Asia. Education and crackdowns need to continue to help mitigate the global trade.
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Thanks for posting!!
Revive the awareness over and over, FIGHT AGAINST WILDLIFE HOSTILITIES. ❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️
Just me or does the presenter sound like David Schwimmer lol.
Thanks for this, it helps my Carnivore zoology project
In the segment about wildlife smuggling, they should have had a breeder of exotic animals on.
was not able to focus, Phill Torres is way to handsome ahahahaha
That is true!
The video is not fully about animal smuggling. Why???? It should have it's own full length video
Hypocrite
In the beginning of this video..They got everything but a bengali tiger up in that shop geez smh✋😬wait it might be in the back...
they take it from the smuggler then they put it in a zoo and charge people to go look at it so they just letting the smugglers do the hard work
also take the fur coats and Python wallets for themselves
after it sits there for awhile u no they taking it
Endangered animals skin teeth fur etc products either need to be given to permiters indevidual like nature centers or usually they have to be destroyed aka incinerated I actually volunteer at a zoo and we have quite a few snake hides that were donated by fish an wildlife the took them from a many that was smuggling them in without proper permits same with a couple pieces of tiger fur. Smuggled animals do sometimes end up in zoos but more likely to end up else where like sanctuaries many are even exported back to place of origin there's so many there's no where for many of them to go
why even smuggle iguanas that are allready so cheap to buy from stores. could understand if it was something expensive.
How much
You’re thinking about the common green iguana. That’s guy who got caught was smuggling Fiji iguanas. They are extremely rare.
This is Animal Cruelty! In other words, this is Murder!
Well on the bright side thanks to some of these smugglers captive bred populations of Fiji iguanas exist, aiding in their conservation. (Hence why there’s no reason to smuggle them anymore)
So it went from animal smuggling to getting people on Mars. Interesting.
Its a basic knowledge to know if the animal is endangered or not
The first 10 min are about wildlife smuggling. Waste of time...
Why is myanmar labled malaysia?
Very disturbing
Very few animals should be pets. Most reptiles, amphibians, invertebrates, fish and some mammals should be able to be kept as pets just so long as the animal is captive bred and humanely raised. Having endangered large cats and bears should be frowned upon unless if it’s for conservation efforts.
No wild mammal in my opinion should be kept as they are all at birth taken from mom which is proven to cause health complications commonly death and in a lot of spieces emotional trauma it's that trauma that causes pet monkeys to do the imfimous behavior of visiously gripping stuffed animals.
Hey farming endangered animals is a good thing because as long as they could make a profit they aren’t going to kill off their livestock because if you don’t have any livestock you can’t make a profit what the big issue with it is that their isn’t a good enough system to track their product to make shore that not wild animals in up in the legal trade system
Yes and no usually farming them drives prices for wild one up cause people want "the real deal" people will also than smuggle illegal parts from wild ones claiming they're from captive breed and slaughtered animals. Sometimes it can work that's what regulated hunting is about allowing people to still hunt the animal but sestainably.
yo bro