Part 4 of the Wildlife crime – understanding risks, avenues for action learning series explores how corruption facilitates marine species trafficking.
4. Regulatory and enforcement challenges
Major challenges in protecting marine wildlife include:
- A lack of scientific data on non-CITES listed species
- Weak or non-existent regulatory regimes in source countries
- Expanding sourcing networks
- The emergence of serious organised crime within the supply chain
- Surging demand for a growing number of species
- Lack of enforcement capabilities in coastal states
While CITES provides trade protections for some species, most are not protected at the international level. In many cases, they also fall outside the law of any country. As a result, much of the trade in coastal marine species in particular remains unregulated.
For example, sea cucumbers across much of their range and North American eels receive no protections from trade and are harvested and shipped to Asia without oversight. Almost all ornamental marine fish are wild caught – only 25 marine ornamental fish species are captive-bred commercially – and most species in the trade are not assessed. In addition, insufficient data exists to evaluate appropriate levels of trade.
The lack of traceability creates opportunities for illegal activity throughout the supply chain.