Relentless Tiger Poaching Brings Activists and INTERPOL Together

Photo courtesy of Brian Scott.

On the Chinese lunar calendar 2010 is the Year of the Tiger, which commences on February 14, 2010 and ends on February 2, 2011. The tiger is the third sign in the Chinese Zodiac cycle, symbolizing fighting courage, which was admired by the ancient Chinese as the sign that keeps away the three main tragedies of a household — fire, thieves, and ghosts.

Things are currently a little different in real life. The tiger is not fairing so well against both the destruction of its habitat and poachers.

In the early 1900s, tigers roamed throughout Asia and numbered over 100,000, according to the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES).

Its current estimates indicate that less than 3,500 of these remain as a whole in the wild. Tigers today are poached for their skins, but also almost every part of their bodies can be used for either decorative or traditional medicinal purposes.

Things are even worse on the island of Sumatra in western Indonesia, where there are as few as 400 tigers left in the wild because of habitat destruction and “relentless pressure from poaching,” according to the World Wildlife Fund.

While the WWF has been monitoring the tigers for years, last September - in an effort to study them better - a research team set up four video camera traps in known tiger routes in the forested ‘wildlife corridor’ that allows animals to move between two protected areas - Rimbang Baling Wildlife Reserve and Bukit Tigapuluh National Park.

After a month in operation, a mother tiger and her cubs were caught on video as they stopped to sniff and check out the camera trap.

The infrared-triggered camera traps, which are activated by sensing body heat in their path, have become an important tool for the WWF in identifying individual animals and monitoring the population changes.

Karmila Parakkasi sets camera trap. Photo courtesy of the WWF.

Regarding tigers in the video, Karmila Parakkasi, the leader of the WWF-Indonesia Sumatran tiger research team, expressed worry, saying, “We are very concerned because the territory of this tigress and her cubs is being destroyed by a number of factors including global paper companies, palm oil plantations, illegal loggers, and encroachers.”

Ian Kosasih, WWF-Indonesia forest program director, added, “When these cubs are old enough to leave their mother, which will be soon, they will have to find their own territory. As tiger habitat shrinks with so much of the surrounding area having been cleared, the tigers will have a very hard time avoiding encountering people. That will be very dangerous for everyone involved.”

Mike Baltzer, leader of the WWF’s Global Tiger Initiative, said, “We want to change the course of tiger conservation. It’s not just about saving the tiger, from extinction, but about doubling their numbers by 2022.”

The Global Tiger Initiative is an alliance of governments, international agencies, civil societies, and the private sector to unite and save wild tigers from extinction. On this front, CITES and the International Criminal Police Organization (INTERPOL) have also joined forces to combat tiger poaching.

Last month, the two organizations held a five-day training program to facilitate and coordinate law enforcement action between wildlife enforcement officers, customs, and police.

Law enforcement officials came from the following countries: Bangladesh, Bhutan, Cambodia, China, India, Indonesia, Lao People’s Democratic Republic, Malaysia, Nepal, the Russian Federation, Thailand, and Viet Nam.

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