A year ago, I set out on a journey to vigorously report on the legal trade in wildlife. Why? Because this gigantic trade is a relentless driver of the world’s biodiversity crisis.
Figures from the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) – the global wildlife trade treaty body – help to illustrate the scale of exploitation.
Its records show that specimens of species like American alligators, tokay geckos, Asian water monitors, brown sea cucumbers, reticulated pythons, queen conch, Red tegu lizards, lake sturgeon, and Black-and-white tegu lizards, along with corals, just to name a few, were traded by the millions from the wild between 2012 and 2021.
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Featured image via Corey Butler / Flickr, licensed under CC BY 2.0 DEED
