Jaguars facing threat from Chinese craze for fangs

LA PAZ: Bolivia’s once-thriving jaguar population is in the crosshairs of a growing threat from poachers responding to growing Chinese demand for the animal’s teeth and skull.

Researchers believe there are around 7,000 of the speckled big cats in Bolivia, out of a global population of some 64,000, stretching from North America to Argentina.

But such is the appetite in China’s huge underground market that “if controls are not put in place, it can lead to a serious problem for their survival”, warned Ms Fabiola Suarez of the Environment Ministry.

Considered vulnerable by conservationists, the jaguar’s future in the South American country is in the hands of antitrafficking police only now coming to grips with the potential scale of the problem.

Local authorities began getting reports of animal trade in 2014 in the northeastern area of Beni, according to Mr Rodrigo Herrera, an advisor to Bolivia’s directorate of Biodiversity at the Environment Ministry.

He says the increased presence of Chinese nationals in the South American country has stimulated demand.

President Evo Morales’ leftist government has awarded US$7 billion worth of public works contracts to Chinese groups, sparking an influx of workers from the Asian giant.

Mr Herrera said each of the cat’s teeth, which measure 8-10cm, can fetch up to $100 for poachers, but that figure can reach $5,000 on the Chinese market.

The feline’s skull is also prized by traffickers, at rates of up to $1,000. Traffickers also sell the skin, and even the testicles, which along with the ground-down teeth, are prized by some Chinese as an aphrodisiac.

While trade in the jaguar or its body parts are prohibited, the big cats have been listed as “near threatened” on the International Union for the Conservation of Nature’s “Red List”.

Mr Herrera said that “from every animal, a poor person can take in up to $2,000”, which is a lot of money”. In Bolivia, 38% of the population lived below the poverty line in 2015, according to the most recent World Bank figures.

Farmers also often shoot jaguars to protect their livestock.