Singapore: Turtle soup? Banned species in pet shops

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Turtle soup? Banned species in pet shops

 

AVA issues warning, importers say turtles looked like their cousins

 

 

 

23-24 July 2005

 

Jasmine Yin

 

 

 

THEY look a lot like the popular child's pet terrapin called red-eared

sliders, but these baby turtles recently found being sold in pet stores here

are of a different species - one in danger of extinction.

 

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Banned for sale in Singapore, the Chinese stripe-necked turtles had come

mixed up in major aquarium stockist Qian Hu's overseas shipment of the more

common red-eared sliders.

 

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They were then distributed to some Serangoon North pet shops - where they

went on sale for between $3 and $8.

 

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Not for long, though.

 

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An undercover team from local animal welfare group Animal Concerns Research

and Education Society (Acres) soon found that out, and its tip-off to the

Agri-Food and Veterinary Authority (AVA) led to a raid.

 

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Altogether, 27 baby Chinese stripe-necked turtles and 19 baby soft-shelled

turtles - another endangered species - were seized from Long Hu Pets

Enterprise, Petmart and Rainbow Pets and Aquarium.

 

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The turtles have been taken to the Live Turtle and Tortoise Museum.

 

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Qian Hu and the three pet shops have pleaded ignorance.

 

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Long Hu's Mr Tony Tan told Today: " Qian Hu supplied to us the

(stripe-necked) turtles. If the supplier says can sell, we sell. "

 

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Mr Bobby Lee, AVA's senior wildlife enforcement officer, said that Qian Hu

had " admitted that it had unwittingly imported " some 40 heads of the baby

Chinese stripe-necked turtles, which were mixed into its shipment of 2,000

baby red-eared sliders by its overseas supplier.

 

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Said Qian Hu's managing director Kenny Yap: " It was our oversight and

negligence ... It was quite impossible to differentiate them when they were

put together. "

 

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The Chinese stripe-necked turtle has a long tail and thin black and

yellow-green stripes on the sides of its head and throat, while the

soft-shelled turtle has a double-barrelled proboscis for a nose and a soft

shell.

 

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Mr Yap added that the company's salesmen were unaware of the Chinese

stripe-necked turtle's recent listing on the Convention on International

Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (Cites).

 

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Qian Hu would seek to be better updated and to educate its suppliers in

future, he said.

 

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In light of both species' recent listings on Cites and the Chinese

stripe-necked turtles' resemblance to the red-eared sliders, AVA has issued

warning letters to Qian Hu and to the three pet shops, but will not take

further enforcement action.

 

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But Acres says it has reservations about the ignorance plea.

 

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" The hard-shelled red-eared slider and the soft-shelled turtles, such as the

stripe-necked turtle, cannot be mixed up. The distinction is very clear

between the two species, " said Mr Ng.

 

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AVA, however, is standing by its position.

 

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" It is difficult to tell the difference. This is our position. They can say

what they want (Acres), " said Mr Lee. - Additional reporting by Vinita

Ramani

 

 

 

ACRES ON THE OFFENSIVE

 

 

 

THE Chinese stripe-necked turtles (picture) were just one of many exposes by

Acres' Wildlife Rescue Team which, posing as buyers of wildlife and pets and

armed with hidden video cameras, has been conducting checks on 100 pet shops

in the past two months. It has found a total of 111 banned animals -

classified by the World Conservation Union as species facing

extinction -being sold in shops here. Said Acres president Louis Ng: " If

such animals are being sold openly in

 

 

 

Singapore, there is quite clearly a lack of enforcement of legislation. We

have been asking for

 

amendments to the law, which fines such traders per species rather than per

animal. But nothing has happened yet. " When queried on the continuing rise

in the illegal wildlife trade, Mr Bobby Lee, AVA's senior wildlife

enforcement officer, reiterated that traders are not sufficiently aware of

the differences between the various species and inadvertently supply them to

pet shops. Mr Lee also stated that the illegal trade in turtles is in fact

not on the rise, as certain turtle species recently included in Cites'

Appendices II and III can be commercially traded with proper Cites permits

issued by AVA. - Vinita Ramani