NakedPlanet

EIASave China Tiger

Profiles:

01 / 2008

BigCats

part ofenvironmental magazine

WWF

Contents :

910121820

WWF work........................................................................................

Tiger Ecology............................................................................

WWF and Tiger Conservation..............................................

WWF in action..........................................................................

Conservation Science.............................................................

EIA 23252628

Species in peril.........................................................................

Tiger Campaign objectives...................................................

A glimmer of hope for tigers.................................................

Victory on tiger farm factory.................................................

News32China’s new film......................................................................

Save China Tigers3947

Report by Ms.Li Quan.................................................................

Tiger’s home.........................................................................

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Recognized throughout the world for

its ferocity and unmistakable beauty,

the tiger faces an uncertain future.

Due to increases in both natural and

human threats, the wild tiger popula-

tion suffered major losses during the

20th century and has become one of

our most endangered species. By the

1950s, tigers living around the Cas-

pian Sea were extinct; between 1937

and 1972 the population of tigers

that once inhabited the islands of

Bali and Java disappeared; the South

China tiger has not been seen in the

wild for more than 25 years, and is

possibly extinct.

WWFwork

India today has the largest number

of tigers, numbering somewhere be-

tween 2,500 and 3,750. However, the

Indian government is expected to

release new numbers in the coming

year. Worldwide it is estimated only

5,000 to 7,000 individual tigers now

remain in the wild. These remain-

ing tigers are threatened by many

factors, including growing human

populations, loss of habitat, illegal

hunting of tigers and their prey, and

expanded trade in tiger parts used

for traditional medicines.

WWF and its conservation part-

ners are working to combat these

threats and save the tiger. Together,

we can ensure that we leave our chil-

dren a planet where tigers still roam

wild.

Tiger Ecology

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Physical Characteristics

The largest of all cats, the tiger is one of the biggest and

most fearsome predators in the world. Weighing up to

500 pounds and measuring more than nine feet from

nose to the tip of the tail, tigers can travel long distances

and bound up to 30 feet in one leap.

Tigers are distinctively camouflaged with their gold col-

oring and black stripes. Their fierce retractile claws and

powerful bodies put tigers at the top of the food chain

- they eat just about anything and nothing eats them.

Diet

Tigers prefer to eat ungulates, or hoofed animals (such

as wild deer and wild pigs), but have been known to eat

fish, birds, and even other predators like leopards and

bears. Tigers are able to eat up to 80 pounds of meat in

one sitting. Hunting, however, can be difficult for tigers

- they are successful in only one or two attacks out of

every 20.

Habitat

Tigers are solitary animals and usually come together

only to mate. Occasionally, however, small groups of re-

lated adults may associate. Mating can occur at any time

and typically produces litters with two or three cubs. Cubs

stay with their mother for about two years, as early life is

dangerous. One half of all cubs born don’t survive to their

third year. Living fairly secretive lives, the remaining tigers

can be found across the continent of Asia in variety of

environments including forests, grasslands and swamps.

Tigers seem to thrive in areas of dense vegetation with

numerous sources of water and large populations of un-

gulate prey.

Threats and Status

The tiger population is thought to have fallen by about 95

percent since the beginning of the 20th century. These re-

maining tigers are threatened by many factors, including

growing human populations, loss of habitat, illegal hunting

(of both tigers and their prey species), and expanded trade

in tiger parts used as traditional medicines for treatment of

conditions such as arthritis and rheumatism.

Only 5,000 to 7,000 individual tigers remain in the wild. Al-

though it is one the most magnificent and revered animals,

the tiger is listed as “endangered” on the IUCN Red List of

Threatened Species and is also listed on CITES Appendix

I, which makes trading of live cats or cat parts (i.e., fur,

bones and meat) illegal in signatory countries.

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WWFTiger Conservation

&

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14

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In the past 100 years, the number of tigers has been re-

duced by 95 percent. We entered the 21st century with

tigers already extinct in a number of their historic range

countries and the remaining tigers on the verge of meeting

the same fate. Across their range, these magnificent ani-

mals are being poisoned, electrocuted, snared, shot and

even captured as cubs - the majority to meet the demands

of the illegal wildlife trade.

Since its founding in 1961, WWF has rallied significant

support for tiger conservation. In devising its landscape

approach, WWF worked with international tiger experts

from IUCN, the Smithsonian Institution, Zoological Society

of London and the Wildlife Conservation Society. Tigers

are the top predator over some of the world’s most diverse

remaining forests, and successful tiger conservation will

not only benefit the animal itself, but also the many thou-

sands of other species that live with it, including humans.

Although tigers face formidable odds, there is hope for this

adaptable, vigorous species.

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WWFin action

The word that best describes WWF and its wildlife conser-vation mission is ‘action.’ Our wildlife conservation mission is illustrated as much by our victories in the corridors of government as it is by the results we achieve through our on-the-ground, ‘muddy boots’ activities in wildlife animal conservation corridors around the world.

Along with our global reach and history of getting things done, what makes WWF so effective is the founda-tion of sound and innovative science upon which all of our work is based. WWF’s Conservation Science Program is responsible for such groundbreaking concepts as ecore-gional conservation of wildlife and the Global 200—both of which have developed a framework through which we will approach the next generation of conservation of wildlife activities.

While our endangered wildlife projects and expertise in the arenas of government and science are critical to ad-vancing our wildlife animal conservation goals, WWF also recognizes that perhaps our most important responsibility is the education of future leaders in the field. Our education program provides fun, interactive activities as well as the engaging classroom material on which they are based.

Read about some of our recent successes and learn more about a sampling of our endangered wildlife projects. As a force for nature in the field, in classrooms and in capi-tols, WWF is In Action around the world, ensuring a bright future for our living planet.

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ScienceC

onse

rvat

ion

Learn about the Kathryn Fuller Science for Nature Fund

We work to fulfill this mission by providing scientific

expertise to WWF field programs in the design and im-

plementation of conservation projects, and by conduct-

ing targeted research on biodiversity and the factors

that threaten it.

Our work addresses issues in terrestrial, marine,

and freshwater realms, and takes place on global, con-

tinental, ecoregional, and local scales. We often employ

technologies such as geographic information systems,

decision-support algorithms, and hydrologic modeling,

and we work to disseminate the skills and capacity

needed to use these tools to field programs and part-

ner organizations.

Fuller Fellowships

Effective conservation requires a solid scientific foundation. The Conservation Science Program (CSP) was founded in 1990 to strengthen this foundation within WWF. Our mission is to advance biodiversity conservation worldwide through the development and application of innovative scientific prin-ciples, tools and information.

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Collaborations with other WWF programs are cen-

tral to our mission, as is our worldwide network of sci-

entific partners in universities, NGOs, and government

agencies. We communicate our results and ideas both

through direct interaction with field programs and more

widely through popular and scientific publications.

CSP has been central in developing many of the core

components of WWF’s conservation approach, includ-

ing the Global 200 and Ecoregion Conservation. And

CSP is actively pursuing the next generation of innova-

tions designed to keep WWF in the forefront of science-based conservation.

Science

22

Species in peril

enviromentalinvestigation

agencyEIA

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The EIA was established in 1984 to investigate, expose and campaign against the illegal trade in wildlife and the destruction of our natural environment. Working undercover to expose international environmen-tal crime -such as the illegal trade in wildlife, illegal logging and trade in timber species, and the world-wide trade in ozone depleting substanc-es - EIA has directly brought about changes in international laws and the policies of governments, sav-ing the lives of millions of rare and endangered animals and putting a stop to the devastating effects of en-vironmental criminals.

EIA is a small organisation which relies on donations from the public, the support of our members, the ef-forts of volunteer fund-raisers and the support of charitable founda-

tions. Yet our efforts have saved the lives of millions of animals. EIA’s fo-cused and hard-hitting campaigns have made it one of the most suc-cessful conservation groups in the world..

Although ambitious, our cam-paigns and projects have defined and achievable goals to gain great-er protection for wildlife and the environment. Our track record of undercover work, scientific docu-mentation and representation at in-ternational conventions has earned EIA a world-wide reputation for highly effective and successful cam-paigning. We also continue to share these skills with local groups and government officials to help power them in the fight against environ-mental crime.

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To investigate, expose and campaign for greater action against the inter-national illegal trade in tiger skins, bones and derivatives

To improve tiger conservation in India, by maintaining international pressure on the government to take action to save wild tigers

Our campaign delivers the hard-hitting truth about those who have failed to act and those that are ul-timately responsible for sealing the fate of the world’s remaining tigers. Our exposés arm those, both inside

EIA’s Tiger Campaign objectives are :

and outside of government, with the information to continue the battle for the tiger; to focus efforts and bring about much-needed changes in the implementation and enforcement of wildlife laws.

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Special Announcement: 03 September 2007

A Glimmer of hope for tigers and other asian big cats.

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Not a single person was seen wear-ing genuine tiger, leopard or otter skin at the 2007 Litang Horse Fes-tival in Sichuan, China. This remark-able contrast to the scenes of 2005, when we witnessed hundreds of people wearing the skins of endan-gered species, is largely due to the success of local and international awareness campaigns.

EIA investigators talked to fes-tival attendees and shop owners in the town of Litang, where locals stressed that it is no longer fashion-able or politically correct to wear or sell tiger or leopard skins, and that these animals are protected.

This long-lasting and profound change in consumer attitude was

also documented by EIA and WPSI in Lhasa in February 2007. The progress may well be localised, but with a continued decline in what was the primary market for tiger, leopard and otter skins, there is room for hope.

What we still need to see is greater investment and commit-ment from the government to intro-duce the right kind of enforcement, aimed at disrupting the criminal networks that are still engaged in trafficking skins. Unless the indi-viduals who control the trade are stopped, they will simply switch to other more diffuse markets for skin, such as the market for home décor and trophies.

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Victory in tiger farm fight

Governments gathered from across the world have united in a call to end controversial tiger ‘farms’. And in a key win in the battle to save wild tigers, The CITES convention on en-dangered species also rejected a lifting of the 14-year ban on domes-tic trade in tiger parts in China.

“This was a major victory for wild tigers, which could be quickly wiped out by poaching if there is a legal market anywhere,” said Ut-tara Mendiratta of Wildlife Protec-tion Society of India, on behalf of the 35 member organizations of the International Tiger Coalition. The international community has sent a clear message that the world can-not sacrifice the last wild tigers for the sake of a handful of wealthy tiger farm investors.”

The International Tiger Coalition said it commended delegates from four countries with wild tigers – In-

29For further details, please go to the Reports and Briefings Section of the EIA Tiger Campaign page http://www.eia-international.org/cgi/reports/reports.cgi?t=template&a=151

dia, Nepal, Bhutan and Russia – and the United States in standing firm on behalf of wild tiger conservation during a lengthy debate. The deci-sion was adopted by consensus, but not before China tried to soften the language. Privately run “tiger farms” across China have bred nearly 5,000 captive tigers and are putting enormous pressure on the Chinese government to allow legal trade in tiger parts within China. They argue that their captive tigers will meet the demand of traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) users for tiger-bone tonic wines and medicines.

EIA’s Senior Tiger Campaigner Debbie Banks said from The Hague today: “This is a real victory for ti-gers. It gives a very clear signal from the international community that it is opposed to the farming of tigers.

“A lift of the ban would simply lead to an increase of demand for

tiger parts and the ‘laundering’ of skins and parts from poached wild tigers. India and Nepal in particu-lar have been heroic and spoken up strongly and passionately in de-fence of tigers and should be com-mended for their stance.”

All international trade in tiger parts is banned by CITES, and Chi-na has banned domestic trade since 1993. The ban has proven success-ful in reducing demand for tiger bone and raising public awareness about tiger conservation, studies have found.

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There are around 5,000 tigers left in the world and India is home to 60% of this remaining population - but it is estimated that one is killed there every day. Since 1996, EIA has been campaigning to force the Indian government to crack down on poaching, trade and habitat destruction. EIA has conducted undercover investigations in consumer countries across Asia, Europe and the USA, to expose the thriving, international illegal trade in tiger products.

Saving the wild tiger is not just about saving a species. It is about securing a long-term future for tigers, the forests they live in and the people who depend on those forests for their survival. It is about good governance and overcoming corruption. If we can’t save the wild tiger, what can we save?

Today, the world’s remaining wild tigers continue to face threats from the international illegal trade in their body parts and the decline in the tiger’s habitat and prey base. At the heart of these issues lies the major factor that has prevented the wide scale reversal in the decline of the world’s tiger population – the lack of political will. At local, national and international levels apathy and inertia have meant that expert recommendations and initiatives are left to stagnate, relegating the tiger to the political wilderness.

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Many ways in which an individual can help :

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• Build a Tiger Online!Upload your photo and help stop the tiger trade.• Say ‘No’ to Tiger FarmingChina is currently attempting to lift the successful ban and legalise the buying and selling of tiger body parts for traditional medicines from farmed tigers. If you would like to take action against this potentially devastating threat to wild tigers please write to the Chinese Ambassador.• Skinning The Cat: Crime and Politics of the Big Cat

Skin TradeIf you have read our new tiger report, seen the news and want to voice your concern, send a letter……

• Write to the Chinese Ambassador in London to express support for Tibetan animal skin burning

Tibetan people are making a valuable contribution to tiger conservation by burning their skin decorated costumes. EIA needs your help in supporting this bold initiative.• Call for a Wildlife Crime Bureau in India• Write to President Hu Jintao of ChinaAdd your voice to help EIA urge the Chinese Government to take action against the smugglers and traders of tiger and leopard skins• Letter Writing Campaign

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“ The EIA team is an example of a new, tougher strain of conservationist. driven to perform daring deeds by man’s exploitation of animals”

The Financial Times

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All eyes on China

in new film

A powerful, short film urging China to keep its ban on the tiger trade has been launched.

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The information film was made by 35 conservation organisations ahead of the world’s largest wildlife trade meeting next week.

One of the UK’s leading actors, Martin Jarvis, lent his voice to the film, which details the consequences that reopening legal trade would have on wild tigers. It is hoped the film will be broadcast on television networks in many countries. The public service film can be viewed at www.endtigertrade.org.

Investors in massive, captive tiger breeding centers in China are currently putting pressure on the Chinese government to lift its successful 14-year-old ban on

trade in tiger parts so they can legally sell products like tiger bone wine and tiger meat.

The topic is expected to be discussed next week when officials from 171 nations gather for meetings of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) in The Netherlands.

“Closing China’s tiger markets has helped take the pressure off wild tiger populations across Asia,” said Steve Trent of WildAid. “If China lifts its ban, it will make it open season on tigers in the wild. The crime syndicates that control the black market for tiger parts will use such a legal market to ‘launder’

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poached tigers through. By keeping the ban, China will demonstrate its continued commitment and global leadership for tiger conservation.”

To protect the ban, 35 environmental, zoo and animal protection organisations, as well as the traditional Chinese medicine community, have joined together as the International Tiger Coalition. The coalition is calling for an end to trade in tiger parts and products through increased intelligence-led law enforcement and strengthening existing tiger trade bans.

“Next week’s CITES meeting gives world leaders an opportunity to speak up for one of the world’s most endangered and most hunted

animals,” said Debbie Banks of the Environmental Investigation Agency. “People around the world who care about tigers must let their governments know that they want them to oppose any resumption of tiger trade anywhere.”

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Save China Tigers

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Founder Ms.Li Quan’s Message

you forget about everything else in the world. The money I spent on such trips went to pay for the people who worked in the lodges where I stayed, with a luxury that only the head of an African tribe was entitled to in the old times. The lodges provided jobs for game guides, cooks, cleaners, managers, vegetable growers, food suppli-ers, trash collectors, and so on, who were all local Africans. Not to mention how much I also spent on buying films, post cards, books, videos and any arts and crafts in the shape of the graceful feline form.

A few years ago, I travelled in Africa’s wildlife reserves: in the early morning or late afternoon sun, jeeps carrying tourists go in search of wildlife in the reserves and take rolls and rolls of photo-graphs of them. The excitement one gets from such sightings of wildlife is hard to describe here, and a close encounter with an ani-mal, especially a big one such as elephant or a fierce one such as a lion or leopard is enough to make

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This is when I saw how eco-tourism was being used to benefit local people while helping protect wildlife at the same time. Because of the tourist money, jobs were created for locals and profit was ploughed back into buying more land for wildlife. Although I had studied literature and business management, and did not know much about conservation, I realized that it is only viable and sustainable if local people support it. The way to get local people sup-porting conservation is to involve them and provide them with an opportunity to have a sustainable livelihood.

Although I was never involved in wildlife conservation, I was always in love with the felines, es-pecially tigers. I told myself: if the Africans had done it, the Chinese can do it. One day, I would like to introduce what I saw in Africa and create our Chinese Tiger Conser-vation Model. In particular, when I saw how a leopard, a lion and a cheetah had created the whole tourist industry around her in South Africa, I started dreaming how a tiger could do the same in China.

In my dream I see reserves in China whose developments are based on principles of Africa’s

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reserves. It would combine the unique resources of wildlife from China using the Chinese Tiger as the umbrella and draw, with the unique cultural re-sources of China, not present in Africa but abundant in China, to compete both domestically and internationally for tourist money. This will then be funnelled back into the reserve, community

development and other wildlife conservation projects. Making moderate use of wildlife resources will help make conservation sus-tainable long term, and the reserve will allow wildlife, which has up to now been under single species protection programs, rejoin Nature and co-exist harmoniously in the wild, thereby safeguarding the entire eco-system.

44 don’t make me suffer

don’t make me suffer

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To accomplish this, we need to do

the following:

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Protecting enough habitat - especially grasslands and forests that support a substantial prey base of muntjacs, serow, and wild boar.

Returning captive trained tigers to that habitat.

Educating and engaging local people in ways that will insure that they support the project and even stand to gain from it in certain economic ways.

Maintaining or developing a genetically sound population of captive tigers.

1.

2. 3.

4.

find me

save me

50What is the home of tigers like?

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In Africa they used leopards, elephants, lions, as em-blems to promote eco-tourism for the whole ecological chain in their reserves.

In China, imagine what it was like a few thousand years ago, before we took all the best land away from the animals: herds of David’s deer, spotted deer, wild buffalo, birds, red dogs, wolves, leopards, and at the top of it all - the King of Beasts- Tigers!

The intention of this proposed project is to restore habitat and protect the whole ecological chain by using the Chinese tiger as the flagship.

In their wild home the animals live free, without hu-man intervention, fending for themselves. They interact with each other, fighting for food, territory and mating rights. Speed and agility are of the essence – whether the animal is hunting or fleeing. As an observer, it is like watching a show, except the scripts and the plots are different every time.

This proposal will also help solve the problems currently faced by single species protection programs.

In a deer reserve, in order to protect spotted deer, the reserve managers had no choice but to trap the red dholes that preyed on the spotted deer. There were too many red dholes for the deer. In our Chinese Tiger home, however, the tigers will control the dhole’s num-bers. All things interact on the planet and they cannot be isolated. A place where wildlife interacts naturally will require less effort on the part of humans in order to function better.

Many of the problems with the conservation of tigers, and other animals, in China, were related to the structure of the nature reserves. So many reserves were set up in the 1990’s, without enough qualified personnel to manage them, and a lack of an alterna-tive livelihood for the people living in and outside the reserves. It is no wonder that they often do not co-operate with the wildlife protection laws but continue to make a living as they did before – eat the mountain when living in the mountain and eat the water if living by the water.

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What does it take to build the new home for tigers ?

As we are talking about giving the tigers back their homeland, it is not a simple matter of several acres of land. The range of one tiger in the wild extends from 15 square kilometres to over 100 square kilometres. This depends on prey density – that is, the availability of food that tigers eat. In China, wild boar and deer of all kind are to tigers what rice, grain and pig are for us Chinese. The prey density in China used to be very high – that is why there were still around 100,000 tigers at the beginning of 1900.

Therefore, to save the Chinese Tiger, we need to make sure they prosper into a population with enough genetic diversity to ensure adaptability to ecological changes and resistance to disease. When we have at least 100 tigers living in several populations, we can be sure their fate is on the way to being reverted. To

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support one population, more than 150 to 200 square kilometres of land may be needed. This obviously depends on the density of prey which in turn is a factor of habitat quality, but tigers do need large areas. For example, a tiger population in SE China may not need a very large area if there is plenty of prey species and the habitat is good, but on the other hand they may need larger areas than reported from other studies - it is unknown.

You may say – the tigers need a lot of land! Yes, the tiger is a large carnivore and eats a lot. It does take a lot of land. That is why the Chinese Tiger Conservation Model is proposed. Tourists will pay a lot to see how ti-gers and other animals live and interact, and the tigers will be making money to support themselves and the people living around them. Tourists will go back again and again because each time, the experience is differ-ent. Each time, the show is different. There is nothing I like to watch more than wildlife and I think many of you will be hooked as well. I am afraid that in the end, China will need more than one or two such reserves to satisfy the demand of our curiosities.

Having said that, it is not enough to just allocate the land to them. It has to be land where it is not too difficult for us to drive a jeep around. Without a vehicle, you can not escape easily from potentially danger-ous situations, although it is very exciting. If you have

restricted access to many parts of the land because the terrain is too difficult, then your chances of seeing a tiger is remote and you will not come back again. You will also tell you friends not to bother. Even in India, where the density of tiger population is highest in the world, you may still not see a tiger in the reserve even if you go for a week. Even though I can introduce the best game reserve management in the world from South Africa, who has the most advanced techniques to ensure that tourists can see a leopard in a matter of three days’ stay in a reserve, and this technique would be applied to the Chinese Tigers, you will still have a hard time to see a tiger if you can not access the land in some way or the other.

After the appropriate land is allocated, we will need to restore the land. Like humans, wildlife needs water, grass, trees, and so on. This is a perfect opportunity to restore what was lost or damaged by human activities. Through the restoration process, we are rebuilding our eco-system, which in turn is good for human beings’ existence.

When the land is ready with abundant food and water, ungulate and bird species can be restored. They will prosper quickly without human disturbance.

When there are enough prey animals, carnivores can be brought into the new home- dholes, bears, leop-ards, and Chinese tigers.

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Publisher, Editor and Art Director Natasha Abramovich www.purrfect-designs.com

Special thanksIngvild Holm (EIA), Save China Tigers, Akvilina Valaytite, Jonny Hardstaff, Simon Downs, Phil Sawdon

Printed at Media Services, Loughborough

Naked Planetenvironmental magazinewww.purrfect-designs.com