Wildlife traffickers exploit legal air and maritime transport companies to smuggle wildlife across all continents of the world
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Illegal wildlife typically travels great distances from source to market, making it a logistics and transport-intensive activity. Wildlife traffickers exploit the increasing connectivity of global transportation, online markets and gaps in law enforcement to minimise the risk of detection.
The USAID Reducing Opportunities for Unlawful Transport of Endangered Species (ROUTES) Partnership brings together transport and logistics companies, government agencies, development groups, law enforcement, conservation organisations, academia and donors to disrupt wildlife trafficking activities, and forms a key element of the concerted international response to addressing wildlife poaching and associated criminal activities worldwide.
45% of air-trafficked wildlife is
smuggled in passenger baggage
The goal of the ROUTES Partnership is To disrupt wildlife trafficking by reducing the use of legal transportation supply chains.
ROUTES is an innovative and transformational Partnership that brings together international conservation organisations, donors, government, and the transportation and logistics industry for a multi-year collaborative program to disrupt wildlife trafficking by reducing the use of legal transportation supply chains. The ROUTES Partnership supports the transport sector by providing targeted data analytics, empowering personnel with the necessary tools and information to be a part of the solution, raising awareness among clients and staff, and ultimately embedding wildlife trafficking solutions within existing company policies.
traffickers rely on public and commercial transport chains to smuggle illegal wildlife products. Transport personnel can play a key role in supporting law enforcement by helping to identify and report wildlife trafficking
Michelle Owen, Project Leader – ROUTES
how ROUTES operates to combat wildlife trafficking
engaging and supporting industry
Comprehensive data and resources are vital for helping the transport sector combat wildlife trafficking. ROUTES is working hand-in-hand with industry leaders to generate new data on wildlife trafficking and help strengthen policies and protocols within the transport sector to ultimately integrate wildlife trafficking measures into existing standards.
training events and resources
There are multiple job types and roles within the transport sector that will benefit greatly from building awareness and understanding of wildlife trafficking. ROUTES is working to inform and train staff that are located in wildlife trafficking hotspots and collaborate to develop materials that industry members can integrate within their training programs.
awareness raising
The transport sector and transport employees have an important role to play in combating wildlife trafficking. ROUTES is working to increase industry awareness of wildlife trafficking issues and support companies’ communications and positions on wildlife trafficking. These efforts to better engage staff enable companies to respond to wildlife trafficking incidents.
more information on ROUTES
More information about the ROUTES Partnership and the resources available to the aviation industry to reduce wildlife trafficking can be found on the ROUTES website.
ROUTES
How Aviation Staff Can Help Stop the Illegal Wildlife Trade
related news and reports to ROUTES
explore news items and recent publications related to our work within the ROUTES partnership or view the latest media coverage on the ROUTES site below.
latest reports and materials
Training modules, trade route monitoring and awareness materials all form part of the way in which ROUTES tackles wildlife smuggling. View the latest resources here.
Visit our resource library for the full TRAFFIC publication archive.
New spotlight video series: meet the aviation companies striving to protect wildlife from trafficking
Digital course on preventing wildlife trafficking in the supply chain now available in multiple languages
core members of the ROUTES partnership
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