Red Sanders Red Alert

Tricks carrying Red Sanders seized in Nepal: smugglers are getting increasingly sophisticated at smuggling the valuable timber out of India Click photo to enlarge © Samir Sinha / TRAFFIC India New Delhi, India, 23 December 2009—A series of seizures of Red Sanders, a valuable timber species native to southern India have taken place in the past 48 hours, and indications are that smugglers are getting increasingly more sophisticated in transporting the valuable timber out of India.

According to media reports, more than 50 tonnes of Red Sanders logs were seized on 22 December in Leh, in the far northern State of Jammu and Kashmir, where it was en route to China. One person has been arrested with more arrests expected.

Further reports state that in the Punjab, almost 11 tonnes of the valuable timber have been seized, with follow-up action netting a further 26 tonnes of Red Sanders from Delhi in recent days. Almost 5 tonnes of Organ Pipe Corals were recovered during the same operation, which has seen five arrests to date. Meanwhile, in Dimapur, in the far north-eastern State of Nagaland, close to the borders with Myanmar and China, Forest Department staff seized a truckload of the valuable timber on 22 December.

“It is evident from the spate of seizures taking place that smugglers of Red Sanders are operating on a massive scale and are running highly organized international smuggling rackets,” commented Samir Sinha, Head of TRAFFIC India.

Red Sanders Pterocarpus santalinus is endemic to the southern parts of India’s Eastern Ghats, mainly the State of Andhra Pradesh.

Today the wood, also known as Red Sandalwood, is in great demand in China and Japan, where it is used to make furniture and carvings as well as medicines. In India it is used to make a dye.

Preliminary research by TRAFFIC suggests that off-cuts of Red Sanders from the furniture industry are sold on into the traditional medicine trade in China Click photo to enlarge © James Compton / TRAFFIC Preliminary research by TRAFFIC suggests that while the use of the rare timber for furniture may be the most significant driver of recent Red Sanders smuggling, off-cuts from the furniture industry are then sold on into the traditional medicine trade.

However, the tree species has been heavily overexploited and its export, except in special circumstances, is prohibited under India’s Foreign Trade Policy. It is also protected under the Red Sanders and Sandalwood Transit Rules of Andhra Pradesh Forest Act, 1967 and international trade is controlled through the listing of Pterocarpus santalinus in Appendix II of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES).

According to their latest annual report, India’s Directorate of Revenue Intelligence (DRI) made 15 Red Sanders seizures in 2008–2009. This was slightly down from just over 20 in each of the years since 2005 when the largest total seized was 466 cubic metres of logs in 2005–2006.

Smuggling attempts uncovered often involve the concealment or misdeclaration of the timber in shipments as everything from jute bags to zinc oxide to mustard oil cake and even salt.

Logs have often been intercepted being transported by road from India to China via Nepal.

Since 2006, almost 1000 tonnes of Red Sanders has been recovered from near various Customs and border posts across India, including the Indo-Nepal border. On the Nepal side, over 400 tonnes of the wood has been seized during the same period, almost all of it destined for China.

However, other overland smuggling routes are becoming apparent. In October 2009, a consignment of around 2000 logs was intercepted by DRI officers near Aizawl, in north-eastern India, believed to be en route to China direct from India. Six Chinese nationals were arrested at the scene.

Elsewhere in north-eastern India, according to media reports, at least 100 tonnes of Red Sanders have been seized in Manipur and Mizoram since August 2009, and 600 tonnes seized by the forest department in transit in Dhubri and Burdawan.

According to the DRI report, in 2008–2009, on five occasions the DRI seized shipping containers with Red Sanders en route to Dubai, and in two cases each it was to UAE and Malaysia. However, a recent seizure finds criminals getting more sophisticated in getting the wood aboard ships to be smuggled out of India.

In November 2009, two clearing agents at Chennai port were arrested in a case involving 32 tonnes of Red Sanders logs. The men were said to have used the name of their regular export clients—who were unaware of the scam—and made duplicate shipping bills, complete with the signatures of all Customs officials concerned. They forged rubber stamps and even duplicated the time locks used by Customs to seal export containers meant to ensure their authenticity. The cargo was then cleared by the agents and loaded onto ships and cleared for export without any Customs check. In December 2009, part of the same consignment was uncovered after DRI officials recalled a container destined for Dubai and discovered 339 Red Sanders logs weighing 9 tonnes aboard.

“We are seeing several changes to the nature and scale of the illicit trade in Red Sanders,” said Sinha.

“For example, logs are being transported via different routes overland and are being shipped to the Middle East, although whether this is to markets in that region or it is just being used as a transit point, remains to be seen.

“The DRI are to be congratulated for their diligence in uncovering these smuggling routes and techniques, but as well as stopping the smuggling in India, we urgently need to find out more about what can be done to control the drivers of the Red Sanders demand in China, Japan and elsewhere.”

The Government of India's Ministry of Environment & Forests Wildlife Crime Control Bureau in New Delhi has published an Enforcer's manual on Red Sanders.

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Giant fish 'verges on extinction'

By Jody Bourton
Earth News reporter

A river giant vanishes

One of the world's largest freshwater fish is on the verge of going extinct.

A three-year quest to find the giant Chinese paddlefish in the Yangtze river failed to sight or catch a single individual.

That means that the fish, which can grow up to 7m long, has not been seen alive for at least six years.

There remains a chance that some escaped the survey and survive, say experts, but without action, the future of the species is bleak.

The concern for the Chinese paddlefish is that its fate will parallel that of the Yangtze river dolphin, a large mammal species that was once abundant in the Yangtze river system, but has recently been declared extinct.

Some people call it the 'elephant fish' and we found out it swims on the surface of the water like a whale Professor Wei Qiwei Chinese Academy of Fisheries Science

A number of fish species vie for the position of the world's largest freshwater fish, including the arapaima (Arapaima gigas) of the Amazon river and the Mekong giant catfish (Pangasianodon gigas).

At up to 7m, the Chinese paddlefish (Psephurus gladius) is much longer than either, though it may not exclusively live in freshwater.

The fish is suspected to be anadromous, meaning it spends some of its life in marine waters before returning to the river to spawn. But it is so rare that little is known about its behaviour, life history, migration habits and population structure.

It is endemic to the Yangtze river system in China.

"It has special characteristics such as its sword-like rostrum. Some people call it the 'elephant fish' and we found out it swims on the surface of the water like a whale," says Professor Wei Qiwei, one of the leaders of the research team from the Chinese Academy of Fisheries Science in Jingzhou, China.

The last confirmed sighting of a Chinese paddlefish was made in the river on 24 January 2003.

Now scientists have published in the Journal of Applied Ichthyology the results of a three-year survey to find and locate the fish.

Professor Wei and colleagues surveyed the upper Yangtze river between Xinshi, Sichuan Province and Chongqing, covering a distance of 488.5km.

Most of this stretch of water lies within the Upper Yangtze National Nature Reserve, a protected area.

Elusive target

Between 2006 and 2008, the team used a number of boats to deploy 4762 setlines, 111 anchored setlines and 950 drift nets in a bid to catch the fish.

They failed to catch a single individual.

The team also used hydroacoustic equipment that beams sound through the water to create a picture of the river and anything in it.

This identified nine possible targets, of which two could be paddlefish, say the researchers. But they could not confirm these finds.

The fish now appears on the brink of extinction, say the scientists.

FRESHWATER GIANTS Record-breaking freshwater fish (weights not included if unknown): Mekong giant catfish 2.7m, 293kg European or wels catfish 4.57m, 336.3kg White sturgeon 3.8m Amazon arapaima 2.48m, 147kg Chinese paddlefish 7m

They speculate that some paddlefish may have eluded the research team, avoiding its nets and capture methods.

Professor Wei also thinks that some younger, smaller paddlefish may also still exist.

"The individuals born in the late 1980s and early 1990s should survive in the wild, since the Yangtze river system is large and it has some complicated habitats where the paddlefish could hide," he says.

But without intervention, the future for the species is bleak.

"It is not a good future for the species. Maybe we have only ten years to save the species according to the estimated life span of 30 to 40 years," Professor Wei says.

"The offspring born in 1990 will be 30 years old by 2020. It is impossible for the species to be a viable population by natural reproduction. With the current situation of ecology and environment in the Yangtze river, man assistant measures have to be taken."

With so few fish left the team proposes that modern reproduction methods need to be considered, such as using surrogates to rear the fish in captivity.

Other techniques may include preserving genetic material, cloning, or gynogenesis, where fish eggs are coerced into developing via parthenogenesis.

However the team need to find live paddlefish in order to be able to start this process.

From the middle of last century the population of Chinese paddlefish has declined rapidly due to overfishing, habitat degradation and pollution.

The construction of the Gezhouba dam in 1981 on the Yangtze river also created a barrier to the migrating fish which further affected fish stocks.

The species has been listed as critically endangered on the International Union for the Conservation of Nature's Red List of Threatened Species since 1996.

Last chance to find

The team believe the upper Yangtze is probably one of the last places that the fish may be present and propose to focus their efforts there.

They also hope to be in a position to act if any fish materialise on the river.

"In the last three years, we have been trying to set a quick-response network along the upper-stem of the Yangtze river to save accidental catches of the paddlefish," Professor Wei says.

"However, the network not only costs money and time, but is also a great challenge."

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163 new species found – let’s not lose them now!

25 September 2009

A new WWF report celebrates the recent discovery of 163 new species in the Greater Mekong region of South-east Asia – including a bird-eating fanged frog, a leopard-patterned gecko and a bird that would rather walk than fly – but we also warn they could soon face extinction because of climate change.

Our report, entitled Close Encounters, lists 100 new plants, 28 fish, 18 reptiles, 14 amphibians, 2 mammals and a bird, all identified in the last year by scientists within the jungles and rivers of the Greater Mekong, which spans Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar, Thailand, Vietnam and the south-western Chinese province of Yunnan.

The discoveries include: a bird-eating fanged frog that lies in streams waiting for prey; a bird called the Nonggang babbler, which walks longer distances than it flies, only taking flight when frightened; and the leopard gecko, a reptile with orange eyes, spindly limbs and technicolour skin.

But recent studies show the climate of the Greater Mekong region is changing, and models suggest continued warming, increased variability and more frequent and damaging extreme climate events.

Rising seas and saltwater intrusion will cause major coastal impacts, especially in the Mekong River delta, one of the three most vulnerable deltas on Earth, according to the most recent International Panel on Climate Change report.

WWF’s Heather Sohl says: “It’s great news that science is uncovering exciting and unusual new species like these, but it’s very worrying that no sooner do we find a new species than we have to sound an alarm over its prospects for survival.

“Rare, endangered and endemic species like these will be especially vulnerable to climate change, which has the potential to reduce their already restricted habitats.

“WWF is already working with governments and industries in the six Greater Mekong nations to conserve and sustainably manage 600,000 km2 of trans boundary forest and freshwater habitats in this unique and rapidly changing land. But we also need global action.

“With UN climate talks beginning in Bangkok this week, we’re urging world leaders to sign a strong global climate deal to prevent runaway climate change and to help safeguard regions like the Greater Mekong.”

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