Associate Professor Andreas Schloenhardt has been awarded funding by the TC Beirne Schoolof Law for the following research project:
The trafficking in fauna and flora considerably accelerates the destruction of forest and wildlife resources and contributes to deforestation, desertification, and other environmental degradation. It also has a negative impact on biodiversity as it destroys many unique natural habitats, and deprives developing countries and their populations of scarce renewable resources. The loss of income from the legal trade in these resources erodes the revenues of governments in the region and undermines their ability to implement development programmes and strengthen the rule of law. The existing systems have also enabled corruption to flourish, and yielded considerable profits for corrupt forestry and wildlife officials as well as politicians in the form of bribes and commissions. This, in turn, has given logging and hunting companies the freedom to engage in illegal practices without fear of prosecution.
The high demand for timber, wildlife, animal parts, and plant material within the Asia Pacific region and around the world has seen large scale illegal logging, harvesting, and hunting operations throughout the region. Considerably cheaper than legally sourced material, the trade in illegal fauna and flora offers opportunities to make significant profits. The gaps in domestic and international control regimes, difficulties in identifying illegal commodities and secondary products, along with intricate trafficking routes have resulted in an inability to effectively curtail the trade.
The purpose of this study is to explore the scale of the trafficking in wildlife and flora in the Asia Pacific region and identify the modi operandi in the commodity chain, including the illegal logging and hunting, trafficking, importation, and consumption of fauna and flora. The study examines the roles of criminal organisations in this trade and the involvement of legitimate businesses in the process. Further, the study outlines and evaluates the effectiveness of the current legislative frameworks to prevent and suppress the trafficking of fauna and flora at domestic, regional, and international levels. The goal of this study is to contribute to the knowledge and understanding of the illicit trade in wildlife and flora in the region and to contribute to enhancing existing measures to prevent and suppress this illicit type of crime.