The Prince Steps In

"Now is the time for young people who believe passionately in protecting these animals to speak out before it's too late."

~Prince William

Click here for an amazing and inspirational speech by Prince William, that shows us that young people CAN make a difference!

He said that: “Either we take action to stem the trade or we will run out of the animals – there is no other outcome possible.”

The Duke was addressing a conference of conservationists, law enforcement officers and politicians from around the world who gathered at St James’s Palace to discuss new ways of tacking the £6.6 billion annual trade in smuggled ivory, rhino horns and products made from endangered species.

His father, the Prince of Wales, who hosted the meeting, spoke starkly of rhinos, tigers and elephants disappearing from the wild “within a decade or even less” if the “astonishing explosion in poaching” by organised gangs was not stopped.

He said the world was in a “terrible race against time” to save species “whose loss will be an immeasurable stain on the whole course of human history, as well as an enduring and irreversible tragedy”.

The End Wildlife Crime conference was the most high-profile event yet organised by the Prince of Wales’s International Sustainability Unit, and was attended by Owen Paterson, the Environment Secretary, who agreed that “history will not forgive us” if world leaders failed to act.

In the autumn the Government will host a meeting of heads of state from around the world to discuss ways of stamping out what the Prince described as “one of the most serious threats to wildlife ever”, which has been fuelled by demand for status symbols such as carved ivory from a growing middle class in countries including China and Vietnam.

The Prince convened yesterday’s meeting to generate ideas which can be put to the heads of state later this year.

He said: “As a father and soon-to-be grandfather, I find it inconceivable that our children could live in a world bereft of these animals.”

He also stressed that stamping out the wildlife trade was not just about protecting animals, as proceeds from poaching are used to fund terrorism and the trade is often linked to human trafficking, drug dealing and murder.

The Duke of Cambridge said education was crucial to ensure that people buying “luxurious and fashionable” goods made from illegal animal parts were made aware of the “barbarity” of how they were obtained.

Past experience in countries such as Japan, where the Duke of Edinburgh campaigned for an end to ivory imports in the 1990s, has shown that when consumers realise animals are slaughtered by poachers for their tusks and other body parts, demand dries up.

The Prince and the Duke were shown a bewildering variety of goods seized by UK Border Police, including books bound in elephant hide, phials of bear bile used in traditional medicines (“Just terrible”, said the Prince) a bottle of whisky containing a whole snake and numerous rhino horns concealed in china dolls and wooden statuettes.

The Duke of Cambridge stroked a tiny stuffed tiger cub, no bigger than a guinea pig, and said: “Unbelievable. Something so small as that. Such a waste.”

Grant Miller, of the UK Border Force, said that in the past year more than 675 items had been seized, including a Rolls Royce with alligator skin upholstery, 1.6 tonnes of tortoise jelly (a foodstuff) and a live Geoffroys Cat.

In the past, rhino horn and tiger products have been used in traditional oriental medicines, but rhino horn is now being sold as a hangover cure, despite having “as much medicinal value as one of my toenails”, said Mr Paterson, while tiger bones are used in wine which is given as a high-status gift in China.

John Scanlon, of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species, said: “People are now speculating on extinction. They are buying up resources now on the basis that they will be worth more in the future because the species will become extinct.”

~ Gordon Rayner

The Telegraph

May 21, 2013

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