Rare plants disguised as toys and ivory painted black

South African officials became suspicious when they discovered cartons labeled as toys destined for China at Cape Town International Airport.

China is known for exporting toys around the world rather than importing them.

Opening the box for a spot check, they didn’t find the promised toddler cookware or board games inside, but instead found bundles of endangered succulents, all carefully wrapped in toilet paper.

Investigators from the South African Police Service’s Endangered Species Unit told the BBC that a total of 23,000 plants, known as Conophytum, were found in the shipment in April 2022.

A few months ago, a courier company was almost fooled by the same trick, and authorities were on alert.

About a year later, authorities at the same airport discovered cartons labeled with mushrooms. They are also exported to China.

When they opened it, they saw the bags normally used for onions were stuffed with succulents – about 12,000 of them.

“It never stops,” one police investigator said. “You find one of their methods and they come up with another smuggling idea.”

Since 2019, authorities have seized more than 1 million illegally harvested succulents representing 650 different species as they were shipped through southern Africa to overseas markets, according to Traffic, an international organization that investigates wildlife crime.

It is said that in South Africa, law enforcement agencies intercept approximately 3,000 trafficked succulents every week.

South Africa’s National Biodiversity Institute says new markets are emerging due to growing demand for ornamental plants, particularly in East Asia, with many African countries now involved in supplying them, mostly from the wild.

This threatens biodiversity in areas such as the Succulent Karoo, an area described by WWF as covering large arid areas of South Africa and Namibia. Conservation groups say there are more than 6,000 species of succulents growing here, 40% of which are found nowhere else.

One of the most commonly smuggled succulents is conophytum, several subspecies of which are subject to trade restrictions.

That’s because, according to the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List, they are either critically endangered or endangered.

Wildlife trade experts say postal and courier services have become a convenient way to smuggle small plants such as succulents.

A recent World Customs Organization (WCO) report found that the most common method of smuggling animals and plants is packaging them into small parcels and sending them by mail, accounting for 43% of total seizures in 2022, a 17% increase from 2022. .

“Criminals may use a number of different methods to hide illegal items in the mail. One common method is to use children’s toys,” said Dawn Wilkes, postal security program manager at the Universal Postal Union, the association of global postal services.

She told the BBC that such goods usually come from Africa or Asia.

Customs agents know all too well that traffickers are nothing if not cunning.

Last March, officials in the northeastern Vietnamese city of Haiphong discovered an interesting shipment from Nigeria.

The container was filled with what looked like black horns. Upon closer inspection, they discovered that the tusks were painted black.

Experts investigating the illegal wildlife trade say it is uncommon for ivory to be disguised with paint – although Vietnamese authorities have seized ivory hidden in horn shipments in the past.

The tusks seized in Hai Phong included about 550 tusks weighing nearly 1,600 kilograms (No. 252).

This led to the arrest of two people in Nigeria in connection with the shipmentAccording to the Wildlife Justice Commission, which worked with the country’s customs department on the case.

The illegal ivory trade mainly affects Angola, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Kenya, Zambia and Zimbabwe, and is one of the main reasons for the decline in the number of African elephants – the number of African elephants has decreased by about 90% in the past 30 years.

The African forest elephant is listed on the IUCN Red List as a critically endangered species.

Endangered sharks off the coast of Africa have also proven difficult to protect, especially since their fins are a key ingredient in shark fin soup, a highly sought-after delicacy in many parts of the world.

More than 500 shark species have been recorded, and trade is allowed in many of them. But because about 60 species of sharks are endangered, the sale of their body parts is restricted.

Wildlife trade investigators say this is a loophole that traffickers exploit.

A number of cases have been uncovered in South Africa in recent years, when customs authorities were faced with mixed shipments of legal and illegal shark fins.

Traffic expert Sarah Vincent told the BBC: “Criminals will claim that endangered species are actually legally traded species.”

“So it’s critical that law enforcement knows how to tell which is which.”

South Africa is using Traffic’s 3D digital technology to do the job, she said.

Given the increasing complexity of wildlife trafficking cases and the variety of concealment methods, it is important for law enforcement agencies to share information with their regional and international counterparts.

For Elizabeth John, a senior wildlife investigator with the Department of Transportation Southeast Asia, a united front against traffickers is the only way to fight them.

More information sharing over the years has led to an increase in seizures.

According to the World Customs Organization report, confiscations increased by 10% in 2022 compared with 2020 and by 56% compared with 2021.

But the rise in seizures also points to a worrying trend.

“These statistics demonstrate that illegal wildlife and timber trade remains widespread and that traffickers are using a variety of evolving techniques to evade applicable laws prohibiting this illegal crime,” the WCO said.

Wildlife trade experts say the challenge is to equip customs and border control authorities with adequate resources, equipment and training to stay ahead of traffickers’ changing tactics.