Wildlife security

How forensic science can stop slaughter of endangered wildlife

With wildlife crime escalating, maybe it’s time to revamp the international treaty aimed at combatting it. Forensic scientists are proposing a series of changes to the Convention on the International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) to allow new technologies to be unleashed on the problem.

Later this month, the CITES meeting in Johannesburg, South Africa, will hear of growing desperation over the rise in poaching and the illicit wildlife trade, which is said to be the fourth largest illegal trade in the world.

For example, rhino killings in Africa have risen for the last six years, with over 1300 killed in 2015. Some CITES-listed plant species have become more valuable than ever. A 1-kilogram piece of resinous agarwood, used in pricey perfumes and traditional Chinese medicine, sold for $3 million earlier this year, says Ed Espinoza, deputy director of the US Fish and Wildlife Services Forensics Laboratory in Ashland, Oregon.