WASHINGTON, March 30 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/
Twenty-eight organizations involved in tiger
conservation around the world today called on China
to maintain its successful ban on tiger trade, after
tiger farm owners yesterday urged the government to
reopen trade in tiger parts.
China's 1993 ban on domestic trade of tiger bones
has been essential in contributing to preventing the
extinction of wild tigers by curbing demand in what
historically has been the world's largest consumer
market for tiger parts and products. Lifting the ban
would reignite demand for tiger products and would
accelerate the alarming declines of wild tigers
remaining across Asia.
Tiger bone is not needed for traditional Chinese
medicine. Key members of the traditional Chinese
medicine (TCM) community and leading TCM
practitioners have repeatedly expressed support for
the trade ban and dismiss claims that tiger bone is
an essential medicine. Effective alternatives are
now widely available, and demand for tiger bone has
dropped significantly among TCM users. Fewer than 3
percent of TCM shops across China were found in a
recent market survey to offer tiger bone medicines,
suggesting that there is little remaining demand
from
Tiger farms have zero conservation value. Tiger
farming actually has negative conservation value,
since any legalized trade in tiger products will
jeopardize tigers in the wild. It costs many times
more to raise a tiger in captivity than it does to
poach a tiger, so killing wild tigers will always be
more economically attractive. China's tiger farms
now house thousands of semi-tame tigers, which lack
the skills to survive in the wild and which hold no
value to reputable captive breeding programs.
Wild tiger populations across Asia cannot sustain
any increased threat from trade. Banning tiger trade
over the last decade has helped reduce poaching
pressure on wild tiger populations. Experts agree,
however, that if China legalizes trade in products
from farmed tigers, poaching of wild tigers will
certainly increase. Any legal market will open
opportunities for organized crime syndicates to
"launder" poached tiger products as legal and will
make law enforcement far more difficult at a time
when some wild tiger populations cannot withstand
any increase in poaching.
With protection, wild tigers will "breed like cats."
To survive and thrive, wild tigers need large forest
tracts filled with prey and protected from poachers.
Tigers will do the rest.
Aaranyak * American College of Traditional Chinese
Medicine * Animal Welfare Institute * Association of
Zoos & Aquariums * Born Free Foundation * Born Free
USA * British and Irish Association of Zoos and
Aquariums * Care for the Wild International *
Conservation International * Corbett Foundation *
David Shepherd Wildlife Foundation * Environmental
Investigation Agency * Global Tiger Patrol * Humane
Society International * Humane Society of the United
States * International Fund for Animal Welfare *
Save The Tiger Fund * Species Survival Network *
Tigris Foundation * TRAFFIC * WildAid * Wildlife
Alliance * Wildlife Conservation Nepal * Wildlife
Conservation Society * Wildlife Trust of India *
Wildlife Protection Society of India *
World Society for the Protection of Animals * WWF *
Tiger Conservation Group
