IUCN SULi Digest

We hope you’re all staying safe and well during these challenging times.
In case you missed it, SULi was one of over 300 signatories to this open letter to WHO and UNEP calling for a more holistic, effective and equitable approach to wildlife trade rather than a ban.
 
There are so many articles circulating on Covid-19, but here’s a (small!) selection:
 
Wildlife trade and trade bans

• Despite COVID-19, using wild species may still be the best way to save them by Dilys Roe
• Wildlife trade: Regulated markets involving local communities, ‘essential’ to balance humans and nature, Ivonne Higuero, Secretary-General of CITES, speaks to UN News
• Humans Aren’t the Virus by Fiore Longo, Survival International
• Snakes make good food. Banning farms won’t help the fight against coronavirus in The Conversation
• COVID-19-led ban on wild meat could take protein off the table for millions of forest dwellers by Robert Nasi and John E. Fa, CIFOR
• 'We did it to ourselves': scientist says intrusion into nature led to pandemic in The Guardian
• To prevent the next pandemic, it’s the legal wildlife trade we should worry about in National Geographic
• COVID-19—the role of wild plants in health treatment and why sustainability of their trade matters from TRAFFIC
• The covid-19 response and wild meat: a call for local context by Stephanie Brittain, ICCS
• Coronavirus: why a blanket ban on wildlife trade would not be the right response in The Conversation
• Wildlife trade in Mexico, conservation, and pandemics by Vanda Felbab-Brown, Brookings

 
Conservation and wildlife tourism

• Poaching fears rise after coronavirus empties Kenya’s national parks in the Financial Times
• Africa fears poaching surge as Covid-19 lockdown wipes out revenues from wildlife tourism in the Telegraph
• The soaring cost of the Coronavirus pandemic for communities and wildlife conservation by Midori Paxton, UNDP Head of Ecosystem and Biodiversity
• COVID-19: Impact assessment of COVID-19 on the South African Wildlife Ranching Industry from Wildlife Ranching South Africa
• COVID underscores the urgency of holistic community-based approaches to conservation (commentary) in Mongabay
• Coronavirus Pandemic Highlights the Vulnerability of African Wildlife Conservation by Catherine E. Semcer, PERC
• As wildlife tourism grounds to a halt, who will pay for the conservation of nature? in Mongabay
• Amidst COVID-19 situation, community conservation must continue from Kenya Wildlife Conservancies Association
• The impact of the coronavirus pandemic on the safari industry (May update) from Safari Bookings
• Poaching threats loom as wildlife safaris put on hold due to COVID-19 in National Geographic
• Plans to prevent future pandemics must consider gender issues, too (commentary) in Mongabay
• COVID-19: Sustainability and remodelling of the Wildlife Sector webinar on the impact of Covid-19 on Kenya’s wildlife sector

 
Plus, if you haven’t already, check out our new website – and be sure to let us know what you think!
 

• Dilys Roe, Chair IUCN SULi

• CBNRM
• Ecotourism
• Illegal wildlife trade
• Medicinal plant harvest and use
• Recreational hunting
• Rights-based conservation
• Small scale fisheries management
• Sustainable/community-based forest management
• Sustainable use and traditional knowledge
• Sustainable use measurement, monitoring, assessment
• Wild harvest for food
• Wildlife trade (and CITES)
• General (non-thematic articles on sustainable use and livelihoods)

8. My cattle, your rhinos: South Africa’s poverty-and-wildlife conundrum -> The coronavirus pandemic is forcing us to think deeply about human beings’ relationship with the natural world on which we all depend for our survival.
 
9. From poaching to habitat loss, local communities and indigenous people are vital in the fight to save wildlife -> Historically, conservation in Africa has been top down. The outcome is a massive decline in wildlife, as those with the power to create change are neglected or not well-involved. This is what has to change if the current loss of wildlife is to be stemmed. 
 
10. Market-based solutions cannot solely fund community-level conservation (commentary) -> Schemes like ecotourism and payment for ecosystem services should be paired with programs like sustainable local agriculture to prevent the re-emergence of poaching and illegal logging, and to ensure that conservation-oriented behaviours persist when markets fail.
 
11. Why communities must be at the heart of conserving wildlife, plants and ecosystems -> Conservation that centres on the people that know and depend on their environment, including forests, lakes and wildlife, can showcase the leadership of local and Indigenous communities in protecting biodiversity and help achieve global targets.
 
12. Elephants: A crisis of too many, not too few -> Reflections and recommendations on elephants, ecosystems and people in Botswana. There is a way forward.

No new news articles or blogs at this time.

35. Elephant poaching is a humanitarian crisis, too -> Most conservation efforts fail to address poverty as a primary cause of the poaching crisis. Poachers can make more money from one kill than most sub-Saharan Africans earn in an entire year.
 
36. On the IWT horizon: Haiwei—identifying the connection between a global demand for dried seafood and marine conservation -> The largest ever dried shark fin seizures were made by Hong Kong authorities earlier this month in May 2020. However, sharks are not the only marine wildlife trafficked transnationally. The persistent demand for their fins is but one side of a multi-dimensional global trade network of Haiwei.
 
37. Rwanda’s Akagera park thrives thanks to community-led anti-poaching drive -> An informal network of community members, including former poachers, that delivers information to the ANP security team has bolstered internal response to potential poachers even before they enter ANP limits.

38. Haq S, Calixto E, Malik Z and R Kunwar (2020) Ethnobotany as a science of preserving traditional knowledge: A case study of herbal uses of plants in Trans-Himalaya (Ladakh), India. Research Square. DOI: 10.21203/rs.3.rs-20416/v1 (Open access)
 
The authors quantify the traditional ethnobotanical usage and people’s choices of plants and evaluated the composition, distribution, trade and conservation of plants in Ladakh region, India. The results show that the highest priority for local people is the medicinal use of plants.
 
39. Sen U and R Bhakat (2020) Role of traditional ethnobotanical knowledge: Culture and indigenous institutions in medicinal plant conservation. In Saklani A, Navneet and B Bhandari (eds) Ethnomedicinal Plant Use and Practice in Traditional Medicine, IGI Global USA. DOI: 10.4018/978-1-7998-1320-0.ch004
 
The traditional use of forest resources, especially non-timber products such as medicinal plants, not only has deep roots in indigenous populations, but is also practised in a broad segment of culture. The authors use a case study of West Bengal's West Midnapore district in India to illustrate the impacts of an integrated strategy to preserving biodiversity and culture.

42. Canadian caribou hunting ban highlights challenges of wildlife management -> The situation in Canada’s north highlights challenges surrounding sustainable wildlife management worldwide, specifically with regard to the question of how many animals can be hunted in any given location.
 
43. Punjab Urial and communities protecting it -> The return of the species, from the brink of extinction to a viable and healthy population was made possible, and is still driven by an approach that at a first glance seems contrary to conventional notions of wildlife conservation, community-based and managed trophy hunting.

46. To save Cross River gorillas, EU-funded program aims to empower communities -> By supporting programs aimed at securing the economic well-being of communities in Nigeria’s Cross River state, the European Union hopes to help protect Cross River gorillas, Africa’s most threatened great ape.

No new news articles or blogs at this time.

66. Aiming for conservation and development in a corner of Mexico’s Mayan jungle -> Learning from the example of another commune, or ejido, in neighbouring Campeche state, the Laguna OM ejido hopes to both conserve their forest and secure an income through activities such as sustainable logging and ecotourism.
 
67. Lessons for sustainability: Indigenous people and forests go hand in hand -> Of the 650+ indigenous groups who reside in or depend on forests, few match the simple ways of the Baiga of Central India. Derided for their cults and shifting cultivation but acknowledged for their ancient customs of medicine, their hunting prowess and storytelling abilities, the Baiga hold many lessons that can be adapted to a post-pandemic world.

No new news articles or blogs at this time.

No new news articles or blogs at this time.

100. Is it right to blame poverty for environmental degradation? -> Environmental degradation and poverty alleviation are urgent global issues that have a lot in common. They must not be treated separately, because their interrelation is key to a sustainable world. The evident skewness of wealth created by incorrect, selfish capitalistic policies has bifurcated the line of development from sustainability.