News

No longer welcome in Oz

LionAid congratulates the Australian government for announcing yesterday that it will ban the imports of all lion parts in the near future. This comes on the heels of a similar announcement banning the imports of all rhino parts.

The ban will include lion hunting trophies, and was announced by Minister of Environment Greg Hunt. 

The action resulted from the sponsorship by Jason Wood MP (La Trobe, Victoria) who has been highly critical of canned hunting and the industry in South Africa that supports it. Mr Wood goes even further as he states that:

“I firmly believe we should change the Australian Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999 to not only to stop imports of canned hunted African lion body parts but stop all species listed under CITES Appendix I, Appendix II, and Appendix III from being imported unless specifically approved by the Minister for the Environment (such as for non-commercial conservation breeding, research or education)” (http://jasonwood.com.au/issues/canned-hunting/).

This proposal is likely to be controversial , not least because it indicates that Australia would distance herself from CITES regulations and impose much stricter import requirements based on her own biodiversity conservation statutes. Such stricter measures have already been adopted for a number of species by the USA and the EU for example. It might even be construed as a disappointment about CITES’ trade regulations compared to biodiversity conservation necessities and ethical trade requirements. I hope John Scanlon, CITES Secretary General and himself an Australian, is paying close attention.

Picture credit: Rann Safaris

If you have not already signed up to our mailing list, you can add your name here and keep up to date with our ongoing work and, most importantly, DONATE to support our work to conserve the remaining fragile lion populations. Thank you.