What is WildAid?
- International non-profit organisation
- Focus on reducing demand for wildlife
products
- HQ in San Francisco, USA
- Largest offices in China, long history of work
there
- New representatives in Tanzania & South
Africa
- www.wildaid.org
When the buying stops, the
killing can too.
How does WildAid
work?
- Recruit superstar celebrities
- Make Hollywood-quality movies & other media
- Secure free media space from partners
- Roll out large, long-running media campaigns
- Change attitudes and buying patterns!
In China…
- Yao Ming, basketball player
- Jackie Chan, action movie star
- Li BingBing, singer/actor
- Maggie Q, actor
- PSAs screened 000s of times
- $90 million of donated media space in 2014
Shark fin
- Luxury item, used in soup
- Long history of low-level use, consumption
exploded with wealth
- up to 73 million sharks killed for soup per year
- Yao Ming, Beijing Olympics
- PSA, billboards
Shark fin campaign
- Raising public awareness
- Campaigns directed to airlines &
hotels
- Political lobbying
Shark fin campaign
- 24 airlines, 3 shipping lines, 5 hotel groups
ban fin
- 82% decline in sales btw 2012 & 2014, approx
50% price decline in Guangzhou market (47%
retail, 57% wholesale) in 2 years
- Up to 80% declines in prices to Indonesian
shark fishers since early 2000s
Ref: http://wildaid.org/sites/default/files/SharkReport_spread_final_08.07.14.pdf
Shark fin campaign
Important: 2012 serving ban at state
banquets
Rhino horn
- Long history of use in Chinese medicine
- Fever reducer, also related (mostly minor)
ailments
- Often used in combination with herbs
- Rhinos rare in China, extinct late 1600s
- Never a major medication
Rhino horn
- Little-studied comp’d to other TCM
- Modern studies show slight effect in reducing fever
e.g. rats (But et al 1991)
- The only high-quality double-blind study (Tsai 1995)
showed that cheap over-the-counter drug
Acetaminophen was far more effective in reducing fever
in children
Ref: http://www.cites.org/eng/com/sc/62/E62-47-02-A.pdf
Rhino horn
- 1970s to early 1990s poaching epidemic
- Taiwan = major user
- Public awareness, education
- Pelly Amendment trade sanctions from USA
1994
- Massive enforcement action by Taiwan govt,
rhino horn virtually disappears from market by
1995
Rhino horn
1993: Trade banned & horn removed
from official Pharmacopoeia of the
People's Republic of China, buffalo
horn as substitute
Rhino horn: new
demand
VietNam:
- mid-2000s rumours
- General Giáp? National hero
- Cancer
- Hangover cure, party drug, status item, gold
bar, magical jewelry, etc.
- Aphrodisiac/’Viagra’ possibly from western
media
Rhino horn: new
demand
China:
- 2007: Govt. invests $130 million to
“standardise & modernise” TCM
- 2008: Jia Qian rhino paper proposes
industrialisation, promotes horn as a ‘cure-all’
- 2011: Time magazine : Hawk (arms co.),
subsidiary Longhui, rhino farms
- Return to traditional values, “organic”
Rhino horn: new
demand
- *Ever-shifting demand landscape*
- driven by rumours
- stimulated by criminal syndicates &
opportunistic business, *not the main
institutions of TCM or culture*
Rhino horn: new
campaign
- Examples
- PSA to address ignorance of horn
origin and
- Jackie Chan, martial arts movie
superstar, “tools of the trade”
Rhino horn: new
campaign
China survey results 2012-2014
Belief that rhino horn has medicinal effect
Rhino horn: new
campaign
China survey results 2012-2014
Awareness that horn comes from poached wild rhinos
Rhino horn: new
campaign
China survey results
2012-2014
Summary
- Consumer attitudes and buying patterns are
changeable and are changing
- Celebrities and government policies and
statements can influence consumer demand
- Bans as well as decisions to legalise trade
send very powerful messages to consumers
Bans and decisions to legalise trade send
very powerful *messages* to consumers
A decision to legalise trade
= powerful product endorsement for rhino horn
and a powerful statement of our values and beliefs
Do we as South Africa want to be endorsing a
totally ineffective, very expensive,
substance to desperate cancer sufferers?
Do we want to risk massively expanding consumer
demand for horn in a billion-plus people
when current demand is enough to have triggered
a so-far uncontrollable poaching crisis?
Bans as well as decisions to legalise trade send
very powerful messages to traffickers
Prospect/possibility of trade encourages
stockpiling and ‘banking on extinction’
Unresolved questions
from pro-trade
arguments
- Undercut traffickers with cheap product? Or
sell at high prices to make profits for
conservation?
- Flood the market with cheap product to
undercut criminal syndicates? Or to grow the
market with great introductory offers?
Unresolved questions
from pro-trade
arguments
- What is the price of horn? $1,000/kg? Or
$100,000/kg? Retail or wholesale?
- Allow us to trade because we have poaching
under control (e.g. elephants, 2008)? Or allow
us to trade because poaching is out of control
(rhinos, 2015)?
Unresolved questions
from pro-trade
arguments
- What sort of rhinos will trade be incentivising
the production and protection of? Ecologically
non-functional, intensively-raised domestic
animals?
Is the trade debate
just a
divisive distraction?
- Very unlikely to get the votes required at
CITES
(Elephant ivory 2008 once-off sale disaster)
- Is this process moot?
More-productive
discussions?
- What can we do better re enforcement?
Demand reduction?
- How can we reconcile our differences over
conservation policy & work together on
poaching?
More-productive
discussions?
- When is sustainable utilisation an appropriate
conservation tool and when not?
- Lessons from kudus vs. lessons from rhinos
- Should we be conflating trophy hunting with
horn trade?
There is no silver
bullet, but…
…demand reduction campaigns can be
effective
- They are most effective when they present a
unified message
- Trade will send a counter-message to
consumers, potentially creating massive new
demand
- Benefits from trade to wild rhinos are unclear
at best