(CN): Tiger Farms in China Feed Thirst for Parts

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http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/13/world/asia/13tiger.html

 

 

 

Tiger Farms in China Feed Thirst for Parts

By ANDREW

JACOBS<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/j/andrew_jacob\

s/index.html?inline=nyt-per>

Published: February 12, 2010

 

GUILIN, China — The crowd-pleasing Year of the Tiger, which begins Sunday,

could be a lousy year for the estimated 3,200 tigers that still roam the

world’s diminishing forests.

 

With as few as 20 in the wild in China, the country’s tigers are a few gun

blasts away from extinction, and in India poachers are making quick work of the

tiger population, the world’s largest. The number there, around 1,400, is

about half that of a decade ago and a fraction of the 100,000 that roamed

the subcontinent in the early 20th century.

 

Shrinking habitat remains a daunting challenge, but conservationists say the

biggest threat to Asia’s largest predator is the Chinese appetite for tiger

parts. Despite a government ban on the trade since 1993, there is a robust

market for tiger bones, traditionally prized for their healing and

aphrodisiac qualities, and tiger skins, which have become cherished trophies

among China’s nouveau riche.

 

With pelts selling for $20,000 and a single paw worth as much as $1,000, the

value of a dead tiger has never been higher, say those who investigate the

trade. Last month the Indian government announced a surge in killings of

tigers by poachers, with 88 found dead in 2009, double the previous year.

Because figures are based on carcasses found on reserves or tiger parts

seized at border crossings, conservationists say the true number is far

higher.

 

“All of the demand for tiger parts is coming from China,” said Belinda

Wright, executive director of the Wildlife Protection Society of India.

“Unless the Chinese change their attitude, the tiger has no future on this

earth.”

 

Although conservationists say India must do a better job of policing its 37

tiger reserves, they insist that the Chinese government has not done all it

can to quell the domestic market for illicit tiger parts. Anti-trafficking

efforts are haphazard, experts say; China bans the use of tiger parts in

traditional Chinese medicine but overlooks the sale of alcohol-based health

tonics steeped in tiger bone.

 

It is a gray area that has been exploited by Chinese tiger farms, which

raise thousands of animals with assembly-line efficiency.

 

If there is any mystery about what happens to the big cats at Xiongsen Tiger

and Bear Mountain Village in Guilin, it is partly explained in the gift

shop, where fuzz-coated bottles in the shape of a tiger are filled with

“bone strengthening” wine. The liquor, which costs $132 for a six-year-old

brew, is sold openly across the surrounding Guangxi region and beyond.

 

“This stuff works wonders,” said Zhang Hanchu, the owner of a spirits shop

in Guilin. A daily shot glass of the rice-based alcohol, he said, can reduce

joint stiffness, treat rheumatism and increase sexual vigor. With the Year

of the Tiger nearing, demand has been soaring, he said.

 

Opened in 1993 with financing from the State Forestry Administration,

Xiongsen is China’s largest tiger-breeding operation. Some of its 1,500

tigers roam treeless, fenced-in areas, while many others are packed in small

cages where they pace agitatedly.

 

The park is a fairly dispiriting place. In addition to the tigers, there are

hundreds of capuchin monkeys rattling in cages, awaiting their fate as

fodder for medicinal elixirs or medical experiments. There are also about

300 Asiatic brown bears which are tapped for their bile, the main ingredient

of a lucrative supplement said to improve eyesight.

 

Those who pay the park’s $12 entry fee are treated to an extravaganza of

tigers jumping through rings of fire or balancing on balls; if the crowds

are large enough, workers will place a cow and a tiger in an enclosure with

predictably gruesome results.

 

Until a spate of negative press two years ago, Xiongsen proudly sold tiger

steaks at its restaurant as “big king meat.” These days, the park takes a

more low-key approach. The word “tiger” no longer appears on the wine

packaging — “rare animal bones” is used instead — although those who sell

the wine say the key ingredient remains tiger bone.

 

On a recent visit, a regular stream of cars, some with government license

plates, pulled up to a building at the center of the park and drove away

with their trunks full of Xiongsen’s wine tonic. A large sign in the

building’s interior declares “Protecting Wild Animals is the Bounden Duty of

Every Citizen.”

 

A woman who answered the phone at Xiongsen’s winery said the owner, Zhou

Weisen, was not available to comment, but she insisted that tigers were not

an ingredient in the 200,000 bottles a liquor produced each year.

 

In addition to overlooking the sale of tiger wine, the Chinese government

has fueled the market in tiger parts by letting such farms exist, critics

say. Although the State Forestry Administration reiterated its support for

the ban on the trade of tigers last December, it reconsiders the

restrictions each year, giving hope to the politically powerful owners of

China’s 20 tiger farms.

 

If the ban were lifted, critics say, trade in farm-bred tigers would simply

provide cover for poached tigers, which are far cheaper to harvest and bring

in far higher prices because most Chinese believe the healing properties of

wild tigers are greater than those raised in cages.

 

An employee at the forestry administration said the entire staff was away on

a retreat and could not be reached.

 

Debbie Banks, who runs the tiger campaign at the Environmental Investigation

Agency in London, said China’s stated resolve to help end the international

trade in tigers was diluted by its ambivalent stand on domestic sales. “The

government is stimulating and perpetuating demand, which is the real problem

we’re facing,” she said.

 

Despite the grim news, conservationists say the coming year also presents an

opportunity to raise awareness about the problem. All the hoopla surrounding

the Year of the Tiger has captured the attention of many nations, especially

China, whose government is sensitive to criticisms that it is encouraging

the tiger’s extinction. In September, Russia and the World

Bank<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/organizations/w/world_b\

ank/index.html?inline=nyt-org>will

host a summit meeting on tigers that conservationists hope will yield

a

solid plan to restore plummeting tiger populations.

 

James Compton, Asia program director for TRAFFIC, which monitors the global

wildlife trade, thinks the most important step would be for China and other

nations to elevate the interdiction of tiger parts to that of illicit drugs.

“It’s not rocket science to knock out the big traders,” he said, adding that

bodies like Interpol and the World Customs Organization should take on the

fight.

 

Guarded optimism aside, Mr. Compton cannot help but recall the last time the

Year of the Tiger came around, in 1998. There was similar talk then of using

the occasion to marshal the international community. He also has a vivid

memory of the poster produced for the occasion. Its pitch: “Save the Last

5,000 Tigers.”

 

Xiyun Yang contributed reporting.

 

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