Tajikistan and snow leopards
In Tajikistan, hunting of markhor antelope and ibex (wild goats) raises money to pay game guards to protect these species against poaching. Previously decimated, these populations are now recovering, as is their key predator, the snow leopard. Supporters of managed trophy hunting are convinced that the practice has driven the recovery of all three species. Poaching and overgrazing became serious problems under Soviet and post-Soviet regimes, leading to declines in snow leopards, while ibex dwindled to barely 200 individuals in 2009. Eight conservancies have been set up in far-flung, poor areas, where traditional lifestyles are largely dependent on natural resources. Each ibex hunt (5-10/year) generates, after government permit fees and other expenses, US$2,000 for the conservancy. Of this, 30 per cent is invested in local community development projects. Markhor hunt (2-4 per year) command even higher fees. Today the areas are home to around 2,500 ibex, 2,000 markhor (there is no data for markhor pre-2009), as well as 70 snow leopards. Around 300 jobs are directly provided, with 20,000 community members benefiting indirectly in the form of camps, bridges, better roads, better equipped and functioning schools. If trophy hunting and trade in the area was stopped, advocates say that the livelihood impacts would be severe, and grazing and poaching would increase.
In 2016, the International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW) published a comprehensive analysis of the global trophy hunting trade which concluded that ‘as many as 1.7 million hunting trophies may have been traded between nations in the period from 2004 to 2014, with at least 200,000 of that being made up of categories of species, also known as taxa, that are considered threatened’. This map summarises IFAW’s global overview of trophies traded across national borders.
The data shown in this map is a representation of more than 97 per cent of the estimated cross-border trade in the reporting period. The maps show Canada as the world’s largest exporter (34.8 per cent of global trade), followed by South Africa (22.6 per cent). The USA is the world’s largest importer (71 per cent of global imports). Europe is prominently represented on the side of importing countries (see separate map on page 23), only Romania also appears in the top 20 exporting nations.