ORIn addition to the illegal trade in jaguar skins and rhino horns, the trafficking of protected species also concerns plants more and morefrom cacti to orchids through less glamorous and photogenic specimens. Proof of this are “green crimes” (environmental crimes) that timidly appear on the news pages, such as theOperation Atacama that a year ago concerned our country. A thousand cacti, among the rarest in the world, have been seized by the police of the Ancona Forestry Unit to a collector of succulents from Senigallia: some were on the red list of protected species. The “trafficker” – awaiting trial, belonging to a network of 19 intermediaries – allegedly collected the plants during his travels in the Pan de Azúcar National Park, near the Atacama Desert, in Chile, to then import them illegally and sell them on the market black with an estimated value of over 1.2 million dollars. The largest international cactus seizure in nearly thirty years.
A profitable traffic
“A rapidly growing phenomenon that remains hidden: traffickers are rarely caught in the act and prosecuted” explains Anita Lavorgna, Professor of Criminology at the University of Southampton (“I deal with cybercrime and digital social damage, from disinformation to illicit trafficking”), director of the “FloraGuard” project which from 2018 to 2021 monitored the black market in protected plants funded by the United Kingdom Research Council. First study in the field, now presented in the book Trafficking in protected species. Critical and interdisciplinary perspectives (Franco Angeli). «After drug trafficking, counterfeit goods and human beings, the trafficking of protected species is considered one of the most profitable criminal sectors in the world. Speaking of flora and fauna alone, estimates range from 6 to 20 billion euros per year globally“. Technology has understandably broadened the scope of the phenomenon, making it even more difficult to counter it. “Cyberspace has facilitated the meeting between supply and demand by allowing the entry of new players, from collectors to” facilitators “of customs controls, lowering costs and increasing the profitability of the market”. Which, as far as plant species are concerned, is still relatively little studied due to what the professor calls plant blindness, i.e. the inability to recognize the importance of plant species for human activities and the survival of our planet. “Anyone who is in the least informed in fact now knows that buying ivory tusks is illegal, while it is more difficult to imagine whether the extract of an orchid whose sale is prohibited is contained in the shampoo just purchased. Or whether that wooden object that you take home from an exotic trip is part of a protected species ».
The trade in plants goes through the web
In search of advertisements on the edge of legality on e-commerce sites such as Ebay and AliExpress and in horticulture forums for avid collectors, Professor Lavorgna worked side by side with a computer scientist expert in machine learning software (tool which may be useful in the future to the police) and some researchers of Kew Garden, the botanical garden in London, a Unesco world heritage site. «Their advice helped us, for example, to understand if a specimen was grown in a greenhouse or collected in the wild. And this is just looking at the roots of the plants portrayed in some photos ».
Carnegiea gigantea specimens in the Superstition Mountains, Arizona.
What “forbidden” plants did the Flora Guard team discover? “Alongside the orchids trafficked for purely ornamental purposes (some tropical ones exhibit flowers over ten centimeters in diameter), less photogenic plants are also traded on the web for therapeutic purposes. This is the case of the thorny Sausurrea Costus, cultivated in India and Pakistan and marketed in the form of powders and essential oil used in the production of Indian Ayurvedic medicine. Then speaking of “live specimens” we came across forums in which users were confronted with on hallucinogenic properties similar to those of Ariocarpus Peyote cactusa genus of cactaceae from Mexico at risk of extinction ».
Hallucinogenic plants and photogenic plants
A favorite hobby of quirky influencers, some cacti are sought after for their whimsical appearance, the minimum management requirements, as well as the ability to survive long journeys by post without land, water or electricity. «On the net, users talk about the possibility of collect specimens directly in the deserts of Texas where they grow spontaneously (trade is prohibited) and how to send them in a “secure” way, for example by exchanging information on how to fill in the documents necessary for shipping in a deliberately ambiguous way and to dribble the “Cites” documentation, or the Convention on the International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora which protects protected species at an international level “. In force since 1975, the “CITES system” is part of the United Nations program for the environment and regulates more than 37 thousand species, of which more than 30 thousand are plants. In the various communities that advertise the sale of protected species “some users are aware of the risks of illicit trafficking, others much less and do not even try to hide what they are selling on social media”.
Italy is also involved in illegal trafficking
Wild rare plants have higher prices than cultivated ones and are often accompanied by declarations such as “not having the necessary permits for legal trade”, while poachers sometimes broadcast livestream videos from the field asking customers which plants they prefer. “The controls and protection of endangered species are important not only to safeguard the biodiversity of the planet, but also to avoid the cascading imbalance in the ecosystem of which they are part. Not only that, depending on the “product”, there may be implications related to the subsistence of some populations struggling with a disfigured territory which on the contrary could represent a source of income linked to tourism. Furthermore, some trafficking is connected to episodes of poaching for the control of these resources, as happens in certain African areas for precious woods ». Without going so far, Italy is also involved in this illegal market, both as a country of origin and destination (for example for the import of jaguar skins from Mexico). “Criminal groups are involved in trafficking in endangered bird species, like birds of prey and finches to be sold on European markets, while seahorses and sea cucumbers collected along our coasts are trafficked mainly to Chinese markets ». In any case, with the Acatama Operation, our country has become the symbol of the protection of protected plants. For the first time, 844 cacti confiscated by the Italian authorities have returned to their natural habitat in Chile after a remise en form at the Città Studi Botanical Garden in Milan. They are usually destroyed.
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