Central Africa’s £45 million illegal bushmeat trade

Causing widespread loss of biodiversity

June 2011: A growing and lucrative illegal international commercial trade in bushmeat - the meat and other parts of wild mammals, birds and reptiles - is causing widespread loss of biodiversity, imperilling the livelihoods of communities around the world, and destabilising fragile tropical forest ecosystems, leading to ‘empty forest syndrome', concluded international experts who met earlier this month in Nairobi, Kenya.

ILLEGAL: The bushmeat trade is threatening fragile ecosystems – leading to 'empty forest syndrome'

According to the experts, who represented 43 governments and United Nations agencies, international and national organisations as well as representatives from and indigenous and local communities, the growing domestic trade in bushmeat between rural areas and urban markets is increasingly threatening food security, especially in Central Africa.

In the Congo Basin, for example, increasing population and trade from rural to urban areas compounded with the lack of any sizeable domestic meat sector are the main causes of unsustainable levels of hunting. 

Tackling this unsustainable and illegal trade is critical

‘We see legitimate subsistence hunting being replaced by commercial hunting and trade of often endangered species in tropical forests, including elephants and primates,' said Ahmed Djoghlaf, Executive Secretary to the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD).

National economies and governments also lose significant revenue if wildlife resources are managed poorly. For example, in the Central African Republic, the unregulated bushmeat trade is worth an estimated £45 million per year.

The meeting made a number of key recommendations, including implementing community wildlife management and other improved wildlife management approaches such as game ranching, and hunting tourism; increasing the raising of wild animals such as cane rats in small farms; and supporting the sustainable harvesting of non-timber forest products other than wild meat.

The meeting also recognised the need to clarify and define land tenure and access rights, improve monitoring of bushmeat harvesting and trade, and enhance bushmeat-related law enforcement.

We need coordinated international action
John Scanlon, secretary-general to the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES), said: ‘Tackling the impact of unsustainable and illegal trade in bushmeat is critical for protecting the livelihoods of rural people and conserving wildlife in biodiversity-rich areas.'

Roland Melisch, TRAFFIC's senior director for Africa and Europe noted: ‘TRAFFIC has been at the forefront of efforts to address the current unsustainable trade in wild-sourced meat, and has, with the Central African Forest Commission COMIFAC, developed a monitoring system to enable the bushmeat trade to be better managed in the Central African region, as well as "bushmeat" initiatives elsewhere in Africa in South America that helped improve the food security of rural human populations.'

In 2008, TRAFFIC also recommended the decriminalisation and open management of the wild meat resources for refugee populations living in Tanzania.

‘Stemming the loss of forest fauna will require co-ordinated action between international actors working on forest and wildlife management, conservation of biodiversity, wildlife trade regulation, law enforcement and health officials, and TRAFFIC is ready and able to assist those efforts,' said Melisch.