Hippo teeth trade slips under Cites radar
IN THE Hong Kong shops that Alexandra Andersson visited, she spotted hippo incisors and canines for sale.
“Some are carved into figurines, some are just ‘raw’ teeth,” explains Andersson, a researcher in the conservation forensics lab at Hong Kong University.
The surging demand in Asia for hippo teeth as an “affordable alternative to ivory”comes as warnings sound that hippos, whose numbers are diminishing, could vanish within the next 100 years.
Andersson, with colleague Luke Gibson, is the author of a recent study, Missing teeth: Discordances in the Trade of Hippo Ivory, between Africa and Hong Kong, which warns how significant discrepancies in the trade volumes of hippo teeth could jeopardise the species survival.
“What we concluded is that a possible cause for hippo teeth trade data discrepancies between Uganda and Hong Kong could be trade in illegally harvested hippo teeth – either from within Uganda or trafficked in from nearby countries,” she says.
After examining trade in Citeslisted species in and out of Hong Kong, alarm bells started to ring, she explains.
“I noticed huge discrepancies in importer and exporter reported quantities in the majority of trade transactions – not just for Hong Kong and hippos but across many countries and species.
“For example, since 2000, Hong Kong has declared receipt of over 100 000 more live, wild-caught Southeast Asian box turtles compared to records from the exporting nations Indonesia and Malaysia.”
She decided to focus on the hippo teeth trade, “because I was surprised at the general scale of it (over 770 000kg traded since 1975), and the fact that 90% of that has passed through Hong Kong.
“The fact that 75% of the hippo teeth were supplied by just two exporting nations, Tanzania and Uganda, made the analysis more straightforward and impactful.”
In their study, published in the African Journal of Ecology, the pair note how as the global epicentre of wildlife trade, Hong Kong plays an important role in the “preservation or demise of biodiversity”, including of species found continents away. If mismanaged, legal trade in threatened species can lead to “unsustainable exploitation”.
Inaccurate and incomplete trade records from the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (Cites) undermine the regulation of this trade.
The study details how more than 90% of the global hippo teeth trade is imported to, and re-exported from, Hong Kong.
Of that imported, at least 75% originated in Tanzania or Uganda, but there are notable disparities in declared trade volumes.
“In most transactions, Hong Kong declares more volume imported than the volume declared exported by Uganda. Overall, Hong Kong has reported the import of 3 176kg more hippo teeth than declared exported by Tanzania.
“This indicates that actual trade levels may exceed internationally agreed quotas.
“In total, over 14 000kg of hippo teeth is unaccounted for between Uganda and Hong Kong, representing more than 2 700 individual hippos – 2% of the global population.
“This gross discordance in trade data undermines regulatory measures and challenges the persistence of hippo populations in Africa,” the authors say.
Uganda banned trade in hippo teeth in 2014. The International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) classified hippos, threatened by illegal hunting for meat, climate change, and habitat destruction, as vulnerable in 2008.
But population estimates need to be updated, believes Andersson.
“Since then, thousands of tons of hippo teeth have been traded, and data thereof show signs of inaccurate reporting. Information on the remaining hippo population in Uganda, specifically, and the quantity of hippo teeth in circulation in Hong Kong is invaluable for understanding what led to tons of surplus teeth arriving in Hong Kong” she explains.
Hippo teeth are believed to be easier to smuggle than elephant tusks - international trade in ivory was outlawed in 1989 - and a cheaper substitute for ivory.
Evidence of illegal trade and poaching of hippos in the region, as well as fluidity of borders, is plentiful, she points out.
“In 1992, Ugandan authorities intercepted possession licences for 10 000 hippo teeth illegally issued by a Zairian local authority near Virunga National Park – the same year that 417 smuggled hippo teeth were intercepted by Zairian authorities en route to Uganda. In 1997, officials at Paris Orly Airport seized over 1 700 hippo teeth en route from Uganda to Hong Kong.
“From 1997 to 2003, hippo populations in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) decreased 95% due to intense poaching. In October 2006, rebel groups killed 400 hippos in two weeks in Virunga National Park, which lies in the borderlands of Uganda, the DRC, and Rwanda.
“Thus, poaching and smuggling of hippo teeth are not uncommon in the region, nor is fraud of Cites export permits.
“It’s therefore possible that illegally harvested hippo teeth could account for the major surplus discrepancies in Cites trade data from Tanzania and Uganda to Hong Kong.”