EXOTIC ANIMAL TRADE

Laos Emerges as Key Source
In Asia's Illicit Wildlife Trade
Long an isolated land with abundant forests and biodiversity, Laos is rapidly developing as China and other Asian nations exploit its resources. One of the first casualties has been the wildlife, now being rapidly depleted by a thriving black-market trade.
by rhett butler

Deep in the rugged mountains of Nam Et-Phou Louey National Protected Area on the Laos–Vietnam border, Laotian game wardens came upon the following scene: pieces of the pelt of a recently killed tiger, its bones removed, with rifle shells scattered in the trampled vegetation.

The wardens knew precisely what had happened. Poachers had trapped a tiger in a baited snare that had encircled one of its front feet with a cable and lifted the animal into the air. Coming upon the snarling tiger, the poachers had shot it, then proceeded to carve out its 22 to 26 pounds of bones, which — when ground up — would be sold to middlemen for the Chinese medicinal market. The poachers then cut off the tiger’s penis, which would eventually be soaked in wine and the wine drunk as an aphrodisiac.