Store investigated for advertising banned products
Environment Canada investigated a Richmond supermarket last week after receiving reports the store was selling pangolin products, a mammal with a unique scaly skin listed as an endangered species.
Enforcement officers visited the New 2000 Supermarket, in a shopping plaza at No. 3 Road and Leslie Road, on Jan. 29.
Video posted to the internet a week ago showed a freezer clearly marked “PANGOLIN” and listing a price of $150 a pound. It was not clear what products were for sale in the video but it appeared to be skin or meat.
But officers determined the products in the locked freezer were not pangolin, a spokesperson for Environment Can- ada said on Saturday. “Wildlife officers did not take enforcement action against the supermarket as there were no offences discovered.”
Environment Canada did not say why the store listed the items as pangolin, nor did they say why the store believed they could sell pangolin products, which is prohibited by the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (known as CITES). Environment Canada’s enforcement branch is responsible for the regulation of CITES in Canada.
Postmedia reporters visited the store later on Monday but staff said the manager was out for lunch and wouldn’t be back “for two hours.” Attempts to contact the manager by phone and email were not successful.
The freezer which displayed the pangolin for sale sign was searched by the officers. Some time after they left, the sign was replaced; the new sign listed alligator snapping turtle for sale at $26.99 a pound. Alligator snapping turtle is legal for sale in Canada.
Four species of pangolin originate in Asia, four in Africa. All are endangered.
Some estimates have suggested up to 20 per cent of the world’s illicit animal trade is in pangolin parts. Most of that trade takes place in China and Vietnam, where their scales are especially coveted by practitioners of traditional medicine.
They curl up into a ball when threatened and their scales protect them attack, but poachers simply pick them up.