China buying snow

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China buying snow

China is the biggest market of illegal trade in snow leopards. A data investigation by Hsiuwen Liu uncovers a recent decline in related crimes, but indications of organised trafficking in the rare cats. A snow leopard skin spotted by EIA investigators in Linxia in Photo courtesy Environmental Investigation Agency. Covered in thick white fur with black spots, snow leopards live in some of the highest mountain ranges and plateaus across Central and South Asia. There may be as few as 3, to 6, snow leopards remaining in the wild, though the actual number remains unknown, according to the Snow Leopard Trust, a Seattle-based organisation working to protect the endangered animal. China is also the biggest market of illegal snow leopard trade, according to research by the global wildlife trade monitoring group Traffic. They are also made into taxidermy specimens. Snow leopard bones are also used in traditional medicine. This demand puts further pressure on the population which is already facing rising threats due to habitat loss, climate change and retaliatory killings as a result of human-wildlife conflict. For a long time, researchers and conservationists have been trying to study the scale of snow leopard poaching and trafficking in China. Traffic reported in that to snow leopards may have been poached and entered illegal trade annually since , and that China has by far the largest estimated number of snow leopards poached — to per year. More recent figures on the illegal trade of this elusive and shy cat are not available. The data shows a declining trend in overall snow leopard crime incidents. The total number in the first one third of the analysis period was 2. However, large seizures that involved more than three snow leopards were made until , indicating that organised illegal trade still continues to happen in the country. Banks and her colleagues have been trying to piece together the network of traders operating in China since From Linxia, Gansu, once a trading centre for animal skins, they found a loose, adaptive network of criminals operating from South East Asia, all the way over to the eastern seaboard of China. Snow leopard skins used to make waistcoats for sale in a local marked. It was home to a famous fur market where EIA surveys in counted 60 snow leopard skins. The largest known seizure in China of 27 skins was also made in Linxia: a man named Ma Ha Lu Na confessed that he has bought more than 30 pieces of snow leopard, clouded leopard, lynx skins and other protected wildlife products ranging from 1, to 2, yuan between November and July , and had sold two snow leopard skins for 4, yuan each. Banks said while the scale of recorded open trade has declined over the years because of law enforcement activities in the region, the trade continues in a less public fashion. Seizures with links to Linxia were still made up until The data investigation by WildEye Asia also confirmed that illegal trade continued in Linxia after In one particular case, a suspect named Bi Chengming sourced snow leopard skins in Linxia three times between October and July , and travelled to Urumqi on a passenger shuttle bus to sell the skins to Mu and Yi. Mu and Yi later sold the skins to their local contacts, Wu and Xie. Eleven snow leopard skins were involved in this case, while more snow leopard products were confiscated during the investigation. Bi was sentenced to 7 years in prison with a 50, yuan fine. Today, Bei Da Jie Market is a bustling commercial street selling clothing, tourist souvenirs and local snacks. The fur market was closed down, but research led by Dr Xiaoyu Li and Dr Lingyun Xiao at Peking University showed that the level of poaching in the province still remains relatively high, with secondary poisoning and trapping continuing to pose threats to the snow leopard population in the region. In the past decade, Chinese footprints have consistently expanded in Nepal — China overtook India as the biggest foreign direct investment source for Nepal in , and has since then topped the chart in terms of pledges. In tourism hubs like Thamel, for example, Chinese tourists have overtaken European backpackers as the majority demographic. Tea houses, hotels, telecommunications businesses run by Chinese nationals began to flourish, transforming Thamel into a mini-Chinatown. Chinese nationals have also been involved in gambling and illegal wildlife trade that operates from Thamel. Banks said Chinese nationals they encountered at Kathmandu in Nepal were involved in tiger, leopard, snow leopard, musk, bear, pangolins, rhino, ivory, even seahorse trades. They are also trading orchid species and other plants and fungi. Snow leopard claws were sold in a market in Urumqi. Photo courtesy Ma Ming. Investigations into court verdicts by WildEye Asia found nine smuggling cases in the past two decades that came from Mongolia, through border ports and road checkpoints into Inner Mongolia, China. In most of the cases, snow leopard skins were smuggled across the border by a Mongolian citizen to Chinese contacts in Inner Mongolia for sale. They either hid the snow leopard skins on themselves, or in the hidden compartments of their cars. From to , he and the Xinjiang Snow Leopard Team collected poaching and trade information on snow leopards through site visits and market surveys in China. The team identified four major trade routes of snow leopard products in the country: from Central Asia to Xinjiang, together with locally poached products, to the east coast of China; from Qinghai-Tibet area to Sichuan, Gansu; from the southwest of China to the East; and trade routes in northern and northeastern Inner Mongolia, mainly with sources from Mongolia and Russia. Aishwarya Maheshwari, a wildlife biologist who used to lead the snow leopard illegal trade project with Traffic in Central and South Asia, said in general snow leopard parts enter trade through three different forms. In the Traffic report, the team also identified multiple cross-border trade routes through interviews with local experts, including the Nepal and Mongolia routes mentioned by Banks and Ma. Use the WildEye Asia tool to track snow leopard and other wildlife trafficking court cases. Tags: WildEye , Asia , environmental crime , snow leopards. Print page. Oxpeckers Reporters figav mweb.