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In 2019, Malawi dismantled the Chinese-led Lin-Zhang wildlife trafficking syndicate, a major win in its fight against the illegal wildlife trade, thanks in part to funding from the U.S. government. The Trump administration’s recent slashing of international development funds, however, threatens these gains, leaving frontline enforcers and conservation programs without critical support. NGOs across Africa and Southeast Asia, running initiatives from sniffer rat programs to antipoaching patrols, tell Mongabay they're struggling to fill the funding gap.

The U.S., the largest importer of wildlife products in the world, brings in nearly 10,000 species of plants and animals into the country legally, some of which have a high potential to become invasive species. A recent study assessed these imported species and identified 32 as having the highest risk for becoming invasive, posing threats to local ecosystems and to human health.

China has updated its pharmacopeia, its list of approved traditional and Western drugs, to remove traditional formulas with pangolin scales, offering hope for pangolin conservation - but also leaving some concerns about continued production. The new edition, effective Oct. 1, 2025, removes both raw pangolin scales and all formulas known to contain them, marking a significant step forward in conservation efforts, though conservationists caution that a few untracked formulas may still remain.

As environmental crime goes global and awareness of its massive scope rises, finding agreement between governments on which illegal trades to target, and how, is not simple and leads to a piecemeal approach, a new op-ed argues. The case for international law enforcement cooperation is growing stronger, though, with the U.N. recently launching an intergovernmental process to explore new protocols targeting environmental crime under its existing convention against transnational organized crime, UNTOC.

On Nov. 11, 2024, Alfi Simatupang, a police officer in Asahan district on the Indonesian island of Sumatra, was arrested along with two soldiers and a civilian for allegedly attempting to traffic nearly 1.2 metric tons of pangolin scales. Since that bust, the civilian, Amir Simatupang, has gone on trial; the soldiers, Muhammad Yusuf Harahap and Rahmadani Syahputra, are undergoing a court-martial; while Alfi, the alleged mastermind of the trafficking plot, has not only avoided prosecution, but even been promoted.

The Cape vulture, Southern Africa's only endemic vulture species, has shown positive signs of recovery in some parts of its range, with the overall population stabilizing. In 2021, the species' conservations status improved from endangered to vulnerable, making the Cape vulture a rare success story for vulture conservation in Africa, say conservationists.

Lions are the most-traded wildcat in the world, and the only big cat whose commercial trade is permitted under CITES, the international wildlife trade agreement. Lion body parts, including bones, skins, claws and teeth, trophies and live individuals are traded across the world, both legally and illegally. South Africa stands out as a hotspot for the trade due to the flourishing captive lion industry, which also supplies body parts and engages in canned hunting.

Customs officials at Geneva Airport discovered an elephant tusk in the luggage of a 68-year-old US citizen. The protected ivory was confiscated. A fine was also imposed. The American was stopped by customs officials last week as he was about to board a flight from Geneva airport, as the federal customs authorities announced on Wednesday. The employees of the Federal Office for Customs and Border Security had been alerted by the airport security service. Airport employees had reportedly discovered the ivory while x-raying luggage.

Elephants need water - lots of it. Depending on their size, they must drink 100 to 200 litres at least every two to three days to avoid potentially severe dehydration. In hot weather, an elephant can lose as much as 7.5% of its body mass daily due to dehydration. So, water availability, particularly in dry seasons and drought, is critical to elephant survival. Water dictates where elephants roam, limiting their foraging range to areas close to rivers, lakes, pans, and other wetlands. For example, elephant herds with calves stray no further than 10 kilometres from water.

Plant poaching has been the final straw for some. Conservationists say there’s no time to lose, as they consider an ecological triage for the most at-risk species here. "The most important thing we can do is to reduce other threats on these species, to make sure that the pressure of land transformation, for agriculture, for mining, overgrazing, and, of course, succulent plant poaching, all of these disrupt those systems and really reduce the resilience and the opportunities they have to adapt on their own.

The draft strategy is skewed in favour of anthropocentric benefits - economic, spiritual and cultural - and cannot function in practical terms. South Africa's Draft National Elephant Heritage Strategy, which closed to public comment at the end of February, demands that South Africa's elephants must depend on human social and economic development for their future survival.

A South African court in January sentenced four poachers to several years in prison for two separate crimes committed in Kruger National Park (KNP). The Skukuza Regional Court, which in the past has boasted a near-100% conviction rate and under whose jurisdiction KNP falls, held two South African citizens, Sam Khosa and Solly Selahle, and a Mozambican named Oddis Maluleke, guilty of poaching a rhino and taking its horns in February 2019.

As a source country, transit point, and final destination for animal products, Vietnam is a central actor in the global fight against wildlife trafficking. But for years, the CITES Secretariat has reprimanded Vietnam for not doing enough to combat and dismantle criminal wildlife trade networks that poach and trade wildlife, a major threat to biodiversity and endangered species.

Two police officers have been arrested while in possession of Sh4.9 million worth of ivory tusks in Athi River, Machakos county. The duo, according to police, was nabbed along the Nairobi–Mombasa highway within Kyumbi Township. The matter was reported to Kyumbi police station as the arrest of police officers. Police said the officers were arrested by their two colleagues. “The KWS officers both of KWS headquarters, Nairobi, acting on a tip managed to arrest the officers.

A new investigation by wildlife trade monitoring group TRAFFIC has uncovered an "alarming" slew of online adverts offering illegal wildlife products for sale in Vietnam, despite pledges from multiple platforms to clamp down on such content. The report, based on monitoring of social media groups and e-commerce platforms in Vietnam between June 2021 and July 2023, focuses on items made from body parts of elephants, rhinos, pangolins, tigers, tortoises and freshwater turtles.

Community-led antitrafficking networks are proving pivotal in helping authorities intercept poachers targeting critically endangered and endemic tortoises in southern Madagascar’s fast-disappearing spiny forests. Illegal hunting, both for their meat and to supply the pet trade, has decimated the species’ population in recent decades. Indigenous people living in the range of the imperiled species are motivated to protect them due to long-standing traditional beliefs that value and respect the tortoises.

South Africa has faced a surge in poaching of rare succulents by criminal syndicates since 2019. A recent spike in prices paid for a different kind of plant, a drylands-adapted lily, the miracle clivia (Clivia mirabilis), has drawn the attention of plant-trafficking syndicates to the lone reserve where it grows. Large numbers of clivias have been seized by law enforcement, raising fears that this rare plant is quickly being wiped out from the limited range where it’s known to occur.

Kanyaruchinya, Democratic Republic of Congo - Amid a circle of spectators, a troupe of performers takes center stage. Songs resound, accompanied by the beat of drums and lively dances. A large banner carries a powerful message: "The future of our environment depends on our behavior today." The drumming soon gives way to a play performed in Swahili. We're in Kanyaruchinya, in the Nyiragongo territory of North Kivu province in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Some 200,000 people have sought refuge in the southern part of the province, seeing a conflict that has been raging since…

Two Namibian community conservancies and a tourism operator have turned to the courts to block development of a tin mine. The conservancies say the environmental impact assessments for the open-pit mine are flawed and will disturb wildlife, including critically endangered southern black rhinos. In a similiar case in the //Huab Conservancy, a copper mine disturbed wildlife in the area, forcing rhino-based tourism to shut down.

In July this year, conservationists from North Carolina Zoo in the U.S. and the Grumeti Fund in Tanzania went searching for a white-backed vulture in Tanzania's Serengeti National Park that had been tagged a few weeks earlier. Tracking data suggested the bird had died. The team traveled off-road to the southwestern edge of the park, accompanied by rangers from the Tanzania National Parks Authority (TANAPA). Upon arriving at the bird's location, they came across a gruesome scene: 108 vultures had been sorted into rows, missing their heads and feet.

Across the African continent, elephant populations have largely declined over the past several decades, but some areas show hopeful signs of recovery, according to a new study. Researchers have monitored the numbers of forest and savanna elephants (Loxodonta cyclotis, L. africana) in different parts of Africa since the 1960s. However, few stud ies have compiled all the survey data collected over decades, across the continent, George Wittemyer, study co-author and conservation biologist at Colorado State University, U.S., told Mongabay by email.

Police officers from Mtwapa Police Station, along with Kenya Wildlife Service (KWS) officers, have arrested two Tanzanian nationals allegedly involved in the illegal ivory trade. Paul Kuya and Paul Telek were nabbed from their hideout in Majengo, Mtwapa. The suspects, identified as Paul Kuya (36) and Paul Telek (29), were apprehended in a hideout in the Majengo area of Mtwapa, where authorities uncovered eleven elephant tusks weighing 32.924 kilograms. How did officers recover the tusks? The tusks, valued at KSh 3.3 million, were packed in nylon sacks and concealed in three…

Namibia intends to "cull" 21 elephants in the dry north-west of the country where a small population of desert elephants roam In a statement issued on Monday, the Namibian Ministry of Environment, Forestry and Tourism (MEFT) said they plan to cull 723 wild animals, including 83 elephants, across the country and to distribute the meat to local people as a drought relief program. The so-called cull will take place in national parks and communal areas where authorities believe animal numbers exceed available grazing land and water supplies amid the ongoing drought.

An aerial survey has revealed a dramatic increase in elephant poaching in northern Botswana, with little official concern about reports of the poaching. There has been a sharp spike in elephant poaching in northern Botswana. However, there seems to be little official concern over reports of the poaching. An aerial survey in July revealed 19 poached carcasses bringing the total to 105 since October 2023.

The Congo rainforest is home to one of Africa's least-known and most threatened monkeys: the golden-bellied mangabey. Golden-bellied mangabeys form extraordinarily large troops of dozens of individuals, and field observations reveal a complex social structure reminiscent of that of humans. The species faces significant threats from habitat loss, hunting and illegal trade, with experts pushing for stronger legal protections, including an upgrade from CITES Appendix II to Appendix I listing.

The recent seizure in Thailand of 48 lemurs and more than 1,200 critically endangered tortoises endemic to Madagascar underscores the global scale of wildlife trafficking networks that use Thailand as a transshipment hub. The operation was aided by intelligence from a joint transnational investigation between Thai law enforcement agencies and international antitrafficking organizations working to dismantle global wildlife trafficking networks spanning Asia, Africa and South America.

Large-scale commercial operators are evading Liberian forestry regulations by illegally processing wood destined for export on-site in forests. Timber milled in forests with chainsaws is legally restricted to the production of boards by artisanal loggers for sale on the domestic market, but reporting by Liberian newspaper. The Daylight and research by U.S.-based NGO Forest Trends has found large-scale operators producing thicker blocks of high-value wood for export.

Police and wildlife department officials in Malawi have arrested two men suspected of having killed an elephant in Kasungu National Park in the country's west.

In a recent incident in Katombora, Middle Zambezi Valley, two suspected poachers met a fatal end after engaging in a firefight with Zimbabwe Parks and Wildlife (Zimparks) rangers. The confrontation resulted in the deaths of the poachers, while three others were apprehended. The rangers acted swiftly to protect wildlife and recovered 15 elephant tusks, along with a rifle and ammunition.

A Nairobi court has frozen ownership of a Mercedes Benz and a block of residential flats built on prime land within Allsops area in Ruaraka belonging to televangelist and businessman Jackson Mbugua Burugu. This is in connection with a case of poaching that is pending in court. Lady Justice Diana Kavedza of the Nairobi Anti-Corruption and Economic Crimes Division issued the freezing order following a suit filed by the Asset Recovery Agency. Burugu is a prominent Nairobi-based televangelist who is commonly referred to as 'Bishop'.

It could have been the proverbial pot of gold. Instead, it became at best, an opportunity lost in the fight against transnational organized wildlife crime. On February 2, a Nairobi area court acquitted Hoang Thi Diu, a female of apparent Vietnamese/Chinese dual citizenship, of charges relating to the dealing and possession of 145 kilograms of ivory, rhino horn, lion's teeth, and claws. Objectively, and considering the evidence before the court, the verdict was not incorrect.

Botswana and Namibia have embarked on a joint investigation into the increased incidents of elephant poaching in the northern part of Botswana. "The country (Botswana) experienced a surge in elephant poaching incidents during November and December 2023," Lesego Kgomanyane, the spokesperson for Botswana's Ministry of Environment and Tourism, told Xinhua over the telephone, noting that the development has shone the light on the apparent increase in poaching of elephants in northern Botswana.

Namibia experienced a decrease in rhino poaching this year, registering 42 cases compared to 87 the previous year, but saw an increase in elephant poaching, reaching eight cases, up from four the year before, an official said Monday. In an interview with Xinhua, the Ministry of Environment, Forestry, and Tourism spokesperson Romeo Muyunda said that while rhino poaching numbers have decreased by half, elephant poaching numbers are on the rise. "Poaching is dynamic. While we are winning the fight against the illegal killing of rhinos, elephant poaching is picking up," he said.

At least 35 suspected poachers have been arrested after being implicated in the killing of five elephants in Ruaha National Park in Tanzania's central region of Iringa. Halima Dendego, the Iringa regional commissioner, said late Wednesday that the suspects were apprehended during a joint anti-poaching operation conducted from Nov. 11 to Nov. 20. The operation was collaboratively undertaken by game rangers from the Ruaha National Park, Iringa region officials, the Tanzania Intelligence and Security Services, and the police, Dendego said.

Two men were on Tuesday arrested while trafficking 36 pieces of elephant tusks weighing 77 kilogrammes valued at Sh12 million in Maralal, Samburu county.

Nigerian environmental activists have hailed the federal government's decision to publicly destroy a sizable amount of wildlife products that were seized, such as crocodile skins, pangolin scales, leopard skins, and python skins, as a clear indication of the end of an era marked by various forms of impunity against the safekeeping of wildlife.

The High Court in Malawi has rejected Chinese wildlife trafficking convict Lin Yun Hua's appeal against his 14- year sentence which was handed to him by Lilongwe Magistrate Court. Lin appealed against the conviction and the sentence but the High Court has rejected the appeal because it was filed outside the required period. Lin received 14 years in 2021 for dealing in rhino horn, alongside 14 years for possession of rhino horn and six years for money laundering.

The accused were arrested on November 16, 2022, by the officers from Benoni K9 with the assistance of the Pretoria K9 after they were found in possession of three elephant tusks (ivory) at Oriental Plaza Burna.

Cairo International Airport customs officers arrested two foreign passengers, from Lebanon and Spain, who had attempted to smuggle ivory and drugs, respectively, into the country. In the first case, customs officers manually inspected the luggage of a passenger arriving from the Lebanese capital, Beirut, and found pieces of ivory - the hard, white material of elephant tusks - weighing 16 kg. Egyptian customs authorities said that it is prohibited to possess and trade ivory in accordance with Ministerial Resolution No.

The Standards, Utilities and Wildlife Court at the Buganda Road in Kampala has sentenced two men to five years in jail over illegal possession of ivory. Chief Magistrate Gladys Kamasanyu sentenced Robert Ecat and Charles Kanyenya to five years or a fine of shillings five million after they pleaded guilty to illegally possessing ivory weighing 10.65kg.

Corruption is the air that wildlife crime breathes; it is one of the key enablers of widespread and large-scale wildlife trafficking and one of the biggest obstacles to effective law enforcement. This is according to the Wildlife Justice Commission’s new report focusing on the role of corruption as one of the most important enabling factors behind wildlife crime. The report, "Dirty Money: The Role of Corruption in Enabling Wildlife Crime", presents a collection of case examples to illustrate the mechanisms and modalities of corruption in real terms - how it…

At least five elephants were shot and stripped of their tusks in early April 2023 in southern Chad. Shocked by this wildlife crime, the organisation SOS Elephants of Chad is calling on the government to act firmly against the resurgence of poaching of Chad’s endangered elephants.

Vietnam has seized 11.8 kilograms of rhino horns and 4.7 kilograms of elephant ivory in checked-in luggage on a flight from Qatar, Vietnam News Agency reported on Thursday. Customs officers at Noi Bai international airport in Vietnam’s capital of Hanoi found the smuggled rhino horns and ivory in 41 packages wrapped in aluminum foil in two sets of luggage of a Vietnamese man who had traveled from Angola, transited through Doha, Qatar, and arrived in Vietnam on Tuesday. The seizure came after a random check, and the luggage owner claimed that a person had paid him 50…

Four individuals involved in the illegal trafficking of four ivory tips were arrested on April 5 and 6, 2023 in Makokou, a town in northeastern Gabon. The elephant population in Gabon remains threatened despite regular ivory seizures by Water and Forestry agents. This observation has led civil society to explore actions upstream of the ivory trade process. In Gabon, efforts to fight crime related to protected wildlife species have just resulted in new arrests.

Bulk shipments by sea accounted for most of the illegal wildlife parts seized by authorities around the world in 2022. The data, from U.S.-based nonprofit C4ADS, also show that seizures of elephant ivory, rhino horn and pangolin scales haven’t yet returned to pre-pandemic levels. However, the decline isn’t uniform across all countries, with China's late reopening from the pandemic this year indicating there might be an increase in trafficking in 2023, especially of ivory. C4ADS has called on law enforcement officials to focus on investigating…

Three suspected poachers have been detained by Tanzanian police after they were found in possession of six elephant tusks in the country's northern region of Manyara, police said on Saturday.

Singapore: The director of a trading firm was sentenced to 10 months' jail on Wednesday (Feb 15) for importing 1,787 pieces of elephant tusks from Africa into Singapore, en route to Vietnam. The tusks of the endangered species weighed 3,480kg and were found in a 40-foot container at Pasir Panjang Scanning Station in March 2018. Vietnam national and Singapore permanent resident Dao Thi Boi, 40, had claimed trial to the charge under the Endangered Species (Import and Export) Act. She was the director of VNSG Trading and Song Hong Trading and Logistics at the…

Data from the Kenya Wildlife Service indicates that between 2014 and 2022, dogs led to the documentation of 102 incidents of wildlife trafficking. About 114 people linked to these incidents were arrested and prosecuted during the period. "The dogs are key in deterring these crimes. These cases have gone down because traffickers are now aware of the strict security deployed in our borders, airports, and even ports.