Around a year ago, the pine cone-looking pangolin received the highest level of protection against illegal trading by the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species. While China is meant to abide by those rules, the country still remains a trafficking hub for the scaly animal.
On Wednesday (Nov. 29), customs officials said they seized 11.9 tonnes (13.1 tons) of pangolin scales—the biggest seizure ever—from a port of southern city Shenzhen, which borders Hong Kong, according to state media Xinhua news. Officials said that the scales could translate into up to 30,000 pangolins. That is nearly four times the last record-breaking case, in which authorities in Shanghai seized 3.1 tonnes (3.4 tons) scales (link in Chinese) from close to 7,000 pangolins.
The pangolin, which curls up into a ball when frightened, is the world’s most trafficked wild mammals, thanks to the insatiable demand from China, which uses pangolin parts in traditional medicine. The species is in high demand because as it’s believed to treat everything—its scales are considered to deal with rheumatoid arthritis and inflammation, and its blood is believed to treat asthma, cancer, and reproductive problems in traditional Chinese medicine. Those beliefs have spurred relentless hunting for the animals in India, Africa, and Southeast Asia, driven the species to near extinction.
China has been stepping up its fines and regulations related to pangolin trafficking in recent years. In 2016, two seafarers participated in smuggling pangolins worth of nearly four million yuan ($605,000) were sentenced to five-years’ jail time (link in Chinese) and fined 200,000 yuan ($30,248) separately.
But heavy punishment could not stop people from taking risks facing lucrative profits.
Shenzhen authorities said they found the pangolin scales stored in 239 bags with charcoals in a container. They first seized the cargo in early July and had spent four months looking for suspects before finally got two, surnamed He and Li, who now have been taken into custody, according to Chinese news portal dayoo (link in Chinese). Li first got the scales from Africa before shipping them to He, who received the cargo and handled the sales. The two had transaction records of more than five million yuan ($756,000) according to the officials. Police also found evidence through identifying the location of a photo showing Li’s foot stepping on pangolins’ scales. He came from Anhui, one of the major trading centers for traditional Chinese medicine.
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