An official website of the United States government
Wildlife trafficking is a global phenomenon posing many negative impacts on socio-environmental systems. Scientific exploration of wildlife trafficking trends and the impact of interventions is signifi-cantly encumbered by a suite of data reuse challenges. We describe a novel, open-access data directory on wildlife trafficking and a corresponding visualization tool that can be used to identify data for multiple purposes, such as exploring wildlife trafficking hotspots and convergence points with other crime, discovering key drivers or deterrents of wildlife trafficking, and uncovering structural patterns. Keyword searches, expert elicitation, and peer- reviewed publications were used to search for extant sources used by industry and non-profit organizations, as well as those leveraged to publish academic research articles. The open-access data direc-tory is designed to be a living document and searchable according to multiple measures. The directory can be instrumental in the data- driven analysis of unsustainable illegal wildlife trade, supply chain structure via link prediction models, the value of demand and supply reduction initiatives via multi-item knapsack problems, or trafficking behavior and transportation choices via network inter-diction problems.
more »
« less
Women and urban wildmeat trafficking in the Republic of Congo
As a result of declining biodiversity and increasing rates of urbanization, the illegal urban wildmeat trade is projected to become an integral sector of the wildlife crime industry. Adequate assessment of urban wildmeat trafficking requires investigation into the roles and behaviors of individuals who engage in wildlife crimes. However, akin to much of wildlife crime literature, women's engagement within the urban wildmeat trade have received little investigation. The objectives of our investigation were to (1) explore relationships between women and wildlife products across the supply chain, and (2) determine whether a significant relationship exists between women and specific wildlife products. Through systematic social observations, we evaluate the gendered dimensions of urban wildmeat trafficking in the Republic of Congo between the urban centers of Brazzaville and Pointe-Noire. We place particular emphasis on species of conservation concern, namely great apes, African pangolins, and dwarf crocodiles. Results indicate that there are gendered variations at the species and the geographic level, indicating that women are sourcing and sending their products to different locations than men, and that women are specializing in trade of different species. We attest that urban wildmeat trafficking prevention strategies implement a gender-aware approach due to the unique ways that individuals engage with the industry and how that engagement is gendered.
more »
« less
- PAR ID:
- 10501815
- Publisher / Repository:
- Biological Conservation
- Date Published:
- Journal Name:
- Biological Conservation
- Volume:
- 293
- Issue:
- C
- ISSN:
- 0006-3207
- Page Range / eLocation ID:
- 110587
- Format(s):
- Medium: X
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
More Like this
-
-
Illicit Wildlife Trade (IWT) is a serious global crime that negatively impacts biodiversity, human health, national security, and economic development. Many flora and fauna are trafficked in different product forms. We investigate a network interdiction problem for wildlife trafficking and introduce a new model to tackle key challenges associated with IWT. Our model captures the interdiction problem faced by law enforcement impeding IWT on flight networks, though it can be extended to other types of transportation networks. We incorporate vital issues unique to IWT, including the need for training and difficulty recognizing illicit wildlife products, the impact of charismatic species and geopolitical differences, and the varying amounts of information and objectives traffickers may use when choosing transit routes. Additionally, we incorporate different detection probabilities at nodes and along arcs depending on law enforcement’s interdiction and training actions. We present solutions for several key IWT supply chains using realistic data from conservation research, seizure databases, and international reports. We compare our model to two benchmark models and highlight key features of the interdiction strategy. We discuss the implications of our models for combating IWT in practice and highlight critical areas of concern for stakeholders.more » « less
-
Abstract We have more data about wildlife trafficking than ever before, but it remains underutilized for decision-making. Central to effective wildlife trafficking interventions is collection, aggregation, and analysis of data across a range of source, transit, and destination geographies. Many data are geospatial, but these data cannot be effectively accessed or aggregated without appropriate geospatial data standards. Our goal was to create geospatial data standards to help advance efforts to combat wildlife trafficking. We achieved our goal using voluntary, participatory, and engagement-based workshops with diverse and multisectoral stakeholders, online portals, and electronic communication with more than 100 participants on three continents. The standards support data-to-decision efforts in the field, for example indictments of key figures within wildlife trafficking, and disruption of their networks. Geospatial data standards help enable broader utilization of wildlife trafficking data across disciplines and sectors, accelerate aggregation and analysis of data across space and time, advance evidence-based decision making, and reduce wildlife trafficking.more » « less
-
Legitimate companies are key facilitators of human trafficking. These corporate facilitators include not only websites providing advertisements for commercial sex services but also hotels and motels. Analysis of all active federal criminal sex trafficking cases in 2018 and 2019 reveals that in approximately 80% of these cases, victims were exploited at either hotels or motels. This paper studies the prevalence of the hospitality industry in the crime of sex trafficking and the failure of this industry to address this problem until recent civil suits were filed by victims against individual hotels and chains. Drawing on the civil cases filed in federal courts by victims of human trafficking between 2015 and 2021 along the East Coast of the United States, this paper assesses the characteristics of these hotels and the conditions in the hotels that facilitated sex trafficking. The paper then explores the moral and ethical problems posed by the facilitating role of hotel owners/operators in sex trafficking either through collusion or failure to act on and/or report evidence of individual abuse. Suggestions on how to address the problem are provided.more » « less
-
In this article, we build on the vital insights of feminist thought in economic geography, extending this body of work via a global Black feminist geographic lens. To do so, we center two moments of the Ugandan bridal industry: the international trade of imported dresses and their design and refashioning there. Via the journeys of these dresses, we make visible how connected racial-gendered and classed power relations structure, drive, and manifest global trade networks. We provide geographically contextualized accounts of the gendered-racialization of economies, while always tracing the ties between varied forms of that racialization across place and through history. And we demonstrate the agency and crucial economic worldmaking of African women who labor within and fashion economic geographies. More broadly, we use dress, and the act of dressing up, in two ways. First, via a global Black feminist lens, we show how dress can be a deeply instructive material object that tells us much about the geographies of economies. Second, we use dress as a metaphor for urgent and playful connection, helping us to refashion the subfield of economic geography as feminist, antiracist, and critically transformative.more » « less
- Free Publicly Accessible Full Text
-
Accepted Manuscript1.0
- Journal Article:
- https://doi.org/10.1016/j.biocon.2024.110587
