Destination Asia: The Pangolin Crisis

DESTINATION ASIA

THE PANGOLIN CRISIS

Writer: Wisdom Muzoka Photography: Nikita Lyengar, Wisdom Muzoka

Pangolins have attracted attention in recent years and the reasons are troubling. It is estimated that nearly 300 pangolins are trafficked globally on the black market each day, making the pangolin the most trafficked mammal in the world.

Pangolins use their body and scales to protect themselves from predators by rolling into a ball, covering vulnerable body parts and exposing razor-sharp scales that can easily cut intruders. This keeps predators like lions and leopards at a distance. It is, however, useless against their greatest predator—poachers— who just pick them up.

It is estimated that more than a million pangolins were illegally taken from the wild in the decade preceding the year 2014 to feed the Asian black-market demand for their scales. The demand for pangolins and their scales is fuelled by misinformed beliefs about their healing and magical powers, making pangolins highly prized in traditional Asian medicines, especially in China and Vietnam. Pangolin scales are believed to treat a range of illnesses including asthma, arthritis, malarial fever and deafness, among others. Pangolin scales are also thought to have mystical powers and are thus used to treat women supposedly possessed by devils, among other mystical applications.

However, these claims are speculative and unfounded. Pangolin scales are made of keratin, the same material found in human hair and fingernails, and science hasn’t found either to have healing medicinal use. cent of pangolin scales confiscated in recent years are from African species (Dr. Challender, Dan. Saving Pangolins from Extinction. BBC Two: Natural World. 20th February, 2019). The article is supported by the fact that there were shipments of pangolin scales seized in China and Malaysia, involving an estimated 100,000 African pangolins in 2017 alone.

While their razor-sharp scales and elusive nature cannot protect pangolins from poachers and traffickers, the law can. On a global scale, the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) listed all eight species of pangolins in Appendix 1 in 2016, prohibiting international commercial trade in pangolins and their products. In addition, countries affected by poaching have set up local authorities and legal provisions aimed at protecting pangolins and other wildlife.

Zambia is one of the African countries that has seen a rise in pangolin poaching in recent years; the country is used as a source and transit route for poached pangolins. Pangolins have thus been granted the status of Protected Animal, under Section 130 (1) of the Zambia Wildlife Act No. 14 of 2015. Illegal possession of pangolins or their products carries a minimum sentence of five years’ imprisonment with hard labour and the government seems committed to enforcing this, showing no tolerance to pangolin poachers.

In 2018, authorities arrested two Chinese nationals who attempted to leave the country with pangolin scales in their luggage. Court records further indicate that more than 10 locals were sent to prison for pangolin-related offences in Eastern Province alone last year.

Due to the largely unrestrained poaching of wild Asian pangolins, populations of these mammals left in the wild have greatly reduced, shifting traffickers’ attention to African pangolins. One report estimated that 80 per While law enforcers and conservationists are making great strides in protecting the world’s most trafficked mammal, poaching of pangolins is still a serious issue that needs immediate attention.