A total of 173 bears’ paws were found Saturday in a van carrying waste paper in the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region. A bear cub’s paw weighs between 1 and 2 kg. (Photo: Xinhua)

By Liang Chen

The 173 bears’ paws confiscated by drug-control police Sunday in the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region were poached and smuggled in from Southeast Asia, a police officer told the Global Times yesterday.

Experts interviewed by the Global Times cursed the habit of eating exotic animals, blaming it as the motive behind the rampant smuggling of wildlife despite continuous protection efforts.

“I am sure the bear paws were poached from overseas,” said an official from the Forest Security Bureau of Fangchenggang in Guangxi who asked to remain anonymous. “Most of the wild animals seized were smuggled from Southeast Asian countries, such as Malaysia, Cambodia, Laos and Myanmar, where the dense tropical forests are the habitat for such specimens.”

Drug-control police found the unusual haul, 384 kilograms of bears’ paws and a 5-meter-long python skin, during an inspection of a van near the border with Vietnam, Xinhua reported.

Three suspects were detained and the truck driver admitted that the bear paws were to be unloaded in Kunming, the capital of neighboring Yunnan Province, the report said.

The police official disclosed that all the paws had been handed over to the region’s wild animal protection station to detect whether the bears were wild or farmed and “the examination results will be released Thursday.”

The official noted that Guangxi only serves as a transfer station for animal smuggling, and most of the bear paws were bound for richer areas such as Guangdong Province.

Judging from the paws’ shape and color, it is safe to say that they belonged to black bears, which are classified as a grade-two protected animal in China, said zoologists from the Nanning Zoo in the capital of Guangxi in a previous interview.

This is not the first time that border police have seized a large number of smuggled bears’ paws. In 2006, for example, police in Yunnan Province found 278 smuggled bears’ paws and arrested more than 20 suspects.

A delicacy and ‘good medicine’

In China, a bear’s paw is traditionally regarded as a rare delicacy. A Chinese saying states that “you can’t have both fish and a bear’s paw at the same time,” which has the same meaning as “you can’t have your cake and eat it” in English.

Reputedly the largest wildlife-trade center from Southeast Asia to China, Guangdong Province is notorious for its consumption of exotic animals, including endangered species.

For example, more than 20 tons of snakes arrive in the province on a single day, according to reports. The custom of eating exotic species has now spread to Shanghai and other northern cities. Statistics indicate that more than 20,000 restaurants in Shanghai supply exotic species as food.

Meanwhile, eating exotic species is forbidden and is subject to a fine of between 1,000 and 10,000 yuan ($140-1,400) according to Chinese law and local regulations in Guangdong. But the custom of eating exotic animals continues despite repeated prohibition efforts.

A survey carried out by the Guangdong conservation group Traffic last year found that almost half of the city’s inhabitants had consumed exotic species in the previous 12 months, according to Britain’s The Guardian newspaper.

Another survey indicated that 2.8 percent of urban residents in China regularly eat exotic species, according to the China Wildlife Conservation Association.

Demand dropped shortly after 2003 when the SARS epidemic was reported to be caused by pathogens spread by civet cats and other wild animals. But it has rebounded with rising salaries and a desire to consume exotic food, reports said.

Saving species from the table

Netizens also called on the government to crack down on the slaughtering of wild animals and demanded the whole nation boycott eating endangered species.

When analyzing the reasons for killing endangered species, the police official from Fangchenggang noted that huge economic interests have bred a complex trade in such species.

“Like other frequently smuggled products such as weapons and drugs, the smuggling of endangered species is also fueled by interest and market demand,” the official said. “If no one wanted to eat wild animals, then no one would poach them.”

Police are cracking down on the smuggling of wild animals along the border area, he said.

“Some use precious species to show off their wealth, and others regard it as a rare delicacy that they believe enhances the health of the stomach, cures injuries, dispels colds and builds strength,” said Wang Minzhong, the head of Beijing Wildlife Conservation Station.

Many animals protected in China, such as the golden monkey, large swan, giant salamander, Chinese sturgeon and peacock have all been served on the table.
Some Chinese believe that eating exotic animals gives them more nutrition and strength.

However, efforts to protect wild animals in China have improved in China significantly over the last 20 years since a wildlife protection law was enforced in 1988.

“With the improving legal system, and massive media coverage on the protection of wild animals and improved awareness on wildlife protection, the number of poaching cases has decreased significantly in recent years,” Wang told the Global Times.

In Xiamen, for example, many organizations, governmental or non-governmental, are striving to protect wild animals. Since 1991, October has been regarded as “wildlife protection month” under the suggestion of the municipal forestry department.

An Baijie and Zhang Han contributed to this story