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Study finds 23 websites offer banned wildlife, parts
Feng Zengkun Straits Times 24 Dec 12;

A "PET" tiger, a grey tundra wolf and exotic parrots were some of the animals that online wildlife traders tried to sell to Singaporeans last year.

A new research project by the National University of Singapore (NUS) has thrown a spotlight on dark corners of the country's online animal marketplace.

It found that 23 local websites carried more than 1,300 new advertisements selling trade-restricted animals and their parts - many of them exotic and possibly illegal - in the second half of last year.

The price-tags on the animals added up to $680,000, and this excluded those ads which featured no prices.

In all, more than 50 new advertisements were posted each week during the 28-week study, and the traders could have netted almost $1 million, the project estimated.

The research, likely the first of its kind here, involved monitoring popular local pet and classified ad sites such as Pet.sg and eBay between September last year and January.

The project also included search results of ads posted on the sites in July and August last year.

It found that three-quarters of the ads hawked live animals as pets - either legal or illegal ones. Dead animals and parts such as ivory, horns, skin and fur made up the remainder.

Worryingly, one in three of these creatures and parts was banned here by the Agri-Food and Veterinary Authority (AVA).

Some animals were likely to have been smuggled in. For example, eight advertised species of non-native birds were not imported here between 2002 and last year, according to records.

Species included the vulnerable red-necked Amazon parrot and military macaw.

The report acknowledged that some of the ads were probably scams, such as those hawking pet tigers and wolves.

Also, the ads may not have translated to actual sales.

"But the persistence of the new ads and the views they get suggest there is interest in Singapore in paying for the exotic animals," added the report.

The study also captured only ads in English, so the total number of online animal ads here is likely to be much higher.

Wildlife activists said such ads were "mushrooming" in every part of the world.

Mr Louis Ng, executive director of the Animal Concerns Research and Education Society here, said regular sting operations to nab online traders would reduce the virtual traffic. The group recreated the NUS project between June and August this year after conducting several stings with the help of the AVA, and found fewer ads.

When asked, the AVA said it monitors retail outlets and online sources of sales of illegal wildlife and their parts and products. Between January and last month, it investigated eight cases related to online sales. Of these, three were prosecuted in court.

"AVA also works with online sites such as forums, classified ad pages and auction sites to share information on the laws prohibiting the possession and sale of illegal wildlife in Singapore," a spokesman said.

It is an offence for people to import, export and re-export protected wildlife, including parts and products, without an AVA permit. It is also an offence to possess, sell or advertise wildlife which has been illegally imported or bought. Offenders can be fined up to $50,000 per animal, up to $500,000 in total, and/or jailed for up to two years.