Wildlife Trade and Animal Welfare

The legal and illegal wildlife trade causes immense suffering to hundreds of millions of animals annually, from capture through transport to destination markets.

Key Facts

The illegal wildlife trade is estimated to be worth 7-23 billion USD annually, making it one of the largest criminal economies
Legal wildlife trade involves tens of millions of live animals and hundreds of millions of animal products each year
Capture mortality rates for wild-caught animals destined for the pet trade can exceed 80% before reaching consumers
CITES (Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species) regulates but does not eliminate harmful wildlife trade
The pangolin is the world's most trafficked mammal - over 1 million taken from the wild in the past decade
Wildlife trade creates pathways for zoonotic disease spillover with potential pandemic consequences

Welfare Considerations

Wildlife trade inflicts suffering at every stage. Wild capture - using traps, nets or poisons - kills many animals outright and injures many more. Captured animals are crowded into containers without adequate food, water, temperature control or veterinary care during transport that may last days or weeks. Mortality during transport is common and accepted as a business loss. Animals arriving at markets are kept in appalling conditions. Those reaching consumers as pets are often kept in entirely inappropriate environments. The animals that survive the full journey to become pets or traditional medicine ingredients represent a fraction of those initially captured. Addressing wildlife trade welfare requires both enforcement of existing regulations and reduction of demand for wildlife products.

What You Can Do

Avoid purchasing exotic pets or wildlife-derived products that may originate from wild capture
Support CITES and national enforcement agencies working against illegal wildlife trade
Engage with demand-reduction campaigns targeting traditional medicine markets for wildlife products
Report suspected illegal wildlife trade through reporting platforms like Wildlife Crime Reporting apps