Poaching

Since the 1980s, the term "poaching" has also been used to refer to the illegal harvesting of wild plants.[5][6] In agricultural terms, the term 'poaching' is also applied to the loss of soils or grass by the damaging action of feet of livestock, which can affect availability of productive land, water pollution through increased runoff and welfare issues for cattle.[7] Stealing livestock, as in cattle raiding classifies as theft, not as poaching.[8]

The United Nations' Sustainable Development Goal 15 enshrines the sustainable use of all wildlife. It targets the taking of action on dealing with poaching and trafficking of protected species of flora and fauna to ensure their availability for present and future generations.[9]

Poaching

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In 1998, environmental scientists from the University of Massachusetts Amherst proposed the concept of poaching as an environmental crime and defined as any illegal activity that contravenes the laws and regulations established to protect renewable natural resources, including the illegal harvest of wildlife with the intention of possessing, transporting, consuming or selling it and using its body parts. They considered poaching as one of the most serious threats to the survival of plant and animal populations.[6] Wildlife biologists and conservationists consider poaching to have a detrimental effect on biodiversity both within and outside protected areas as wildlife populations decline, species are depleted locally, and the functionality of ecosystems is disturbed.[10]

Austria and Germany refer to poaching not as theft but as intrusion into third-party hunting rights.[12] While ancient Germanic law allowed any free man, including peasants, to hunt, especially on common land, Roman law restricted hunting to the rulers. In medieval Europe rulers of feudal territories from the king downward tried to enforce exclusive rights of the nobility to hunt and fish on the lands that they ruled. Poaching was deemed a serious crime punishable by imprisonment, but enforcement was comparably weak until the 16th century. Peasants were still allowed to continue small game hunting, but the right of the nobility to hunt was restricted in the 16th century and transferred to land ownership. The low quality of guns made it necessary to approach the game as close as 30 m (100 ft). Poachers in the Salzburg region were typically unmarried men around 30 years of age and usually alone on their illegal trade.[13]

Poaching, like smuggling, has a long history in United Kingdom. The verb poach is derived from the Middle English word pocchen literally meaning bagged, enclosed in a bag, which is cognate with "pouch".[17][18]Poaching was dispassionately reported for England in "Pleas of the Forest", transgressions of the rigid Anglo-Norman forest law.[19] William the Conqueror, who was a great lover of hunting, established and enforced a system of forest law. That operated outside the common law and served to protect game animals and their forest habitat from hunting by the common people of England and reserved hunting rights for the new French-speaking Anglo-Norman aristocracy. Henceforth, hunting of game in royal forests by commoners, or in other words poaching, was invariably punishable by death by hanging. In 1087, the poem "The Rime of King William", contained in the Peterborough Chronicle, expressed English indignation at the severe new laws. Poaching was romanticised in literature from the time of the ballads of Robin Hood, as an aspect of the "greenwood" of Merry England. In one tale, Robin Hood is depicted as offering King Richard the Lion Heart venison from deer that was illegally hunted in the Sherwood Forest, the King overlooking the fact that this hunting was a capital offence. The widespread acceptance of the common criminal activity is encapsulated in the observation Non est inquirendum, unde venit venison ("It is not to be inquired, whence comes the venison") that was made by Guillaume Bud in his Traitte de la vnerie.[20] However, the English nobility and land owners were in the long term extremely successful in enforcing the modern concept of property, such as expressed in the enclosures of common land and later in the Highland Clearances, both of which were forced displacement of people from traditional land tenancies and erstwhile-common land. The 19th century saw the rise of acts of legislation, such as the Night Poaching Act 1828 and the Game Act 1831 in the United Kingdom, and various laws elsewhere.

Violations of hunting laws and regulations concerning wildlife management, local or international wildlife conservation schemes constitute wildlife crimes that are typically punishable.[21][22] The following violations and offenses are considered acts of poaching in the US:

Stephen Corry, the director of the human rights group Survival International, has argued that the term "poaching" has at times been used to criminalize the traditional subsistence techniques of indigenous peoples and to bar them from hunting on their ancestral lands when they are declared as wildlife-only zones.[25] Corry argues that parks such as the Central Kalahari Game Reserve are managed for the benefit of foreign tourists and safari groups at the expense of the livelihoods of tribal peoples such as the Kalahari bushmen.[26]

Sociological and criminological research on poaching indicates that in North America people poach for commercial gain, home consumption, trophies, pleasure, and thrill in killing wildlife or because they disagree with certain hunting regulations, claim a traditional right to hunt, or have negative dispositions toward legal authority.[6] In rural areas of the United States, the key motives for poaching are poverty.[27] Interviews conducted with 41 poachers in the Atchafalaya River basin in Louisiana revealed that 37 of them hunt to provide food for themselves and their families; 11 stated that poaching is part of their personal or cultural history; nine earn money from the sale of poached game to support their families; and eight feel exhilarated and thrilled by outsmarting game wardens.[28]

In rural areas in Africa, the key motives for poaching are the lack of employment opportunities and a limited potential for agriculture and livestock production. Poor people rely on natural resources for their survival and generate cash income through the sale of bushmeat, which attracts high prices in urban centres. Body parts of wildlife are also in demand for traditional medicine and ceremonies.[10]The existence of an international market for poached wildlife implies that well-organised gangs of professional poachers enter vulnerable areas to hunt, and crime syndicates organise the trafficking of wildlife body parts through a complex interlinking network to markets outside the respective countries of origin.[29][30] Armed conflict in Africa has been linked to intensified poaching and wildlife declines within protected areas,[31] likely reflecting the disruption of traditional livelihoods, which causes people to seek alternative food sources.

Results of an interview survey conducted in several villages in Tanzania indicate that one of the major reasons of poaching is for consumption and sale of bushmeat. Usually, bushmeat is considered a subset of poaching because of the hunting of animals regardless of the laws that conserve certain species of animals. Many families consume more bushmeat if there are no alternative sources of protein available such as fish. The further the families were from the reserve, the less likely they were to illegally hunt wildlife for bushmeat. They were more likely to hunt for bushmeat right before the harvest season and during heavy rains, as before the harvest season, there is not much agricultural work, and heavy rainfall obscures human tracks and makes it easier for poachers to get away with their crimes.[32]

Poverty seems to be a large impetus to cause people to poach, something that affects both residents in Africa and Asia. For example, in Thailand, there are anecdotal accounts of the desire for a better life for children, which drive rural poachers to take the risk of poaching even though they dislike exploiting the wildlife.[33]

Another major cause of poaching is the cultural high demand of wildlife products, such as ivory, which are seen as symbols of status and wealth in China. According to Joseph Vandegrift, China saw an unusual spike in demand for ivory in the 21st century because the economic boom allowed more middle-class Chinese to have a higher purchasing power, which incentivized them to show off their newfound wealth by using ivory, which has been a rare commodity since the Han dynasty.[34]

Ivory, which is a natural material of several animals, plays a large part in the trade of illegal animal materials and poaching. Ivory is a material used in creating art objects and jewelry where the ivory is carved with designs. China is a consumer of the ivory trade and accounts for a significant amount of ivory sales. In 2012, The New York Times reported on a large upsurge in ivory poaching, with about 70% of all illegal ivory flowing to China.[55][56]

Fur is also a natural material which is sought after by poachers. A Gamsbart, literally chamois beard, a tuft of hair traditionally worn as a decoration on trachten-hats in the alpine regions of Austria and Bavaria formerly was worn as a hunting (and poaching) trophy. In the past, it was made exclusively from hair from the chamois' lower neck.[57]

TRAFFIC brings to light many of the poaching areas and trafficking routes and helps to clamp down on the smuggling routes the poachers use to get the ivory to areas of high demand, predominantly Asia.[58]

Members of the Rhino Rescue Project have implemented a technique to combat rhino poaching in South Africa by injecting a mixture of indelible dye and a parasiticide into the animals' horns, which enables tracking of the horns and deters consumption of the horn by purchasers. Since rhino horn is made of keratin, advocates say the procedure is painless for the animal.[60] 006ab0faaa