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	<channel>
		<title>Conservation news</title>
		<atom:link href="https://news.mongabay.com/feed/?location=hong-kong&#038;type=post" rel="self" type="application/rss+xml" />
		<link>https://news.mongabay.com/list/hong-kong/</link>
		<description>Environmental science and conservation news</description>
		<lastBuildDate>Sat, 19 Sep 2026 21:22:46 +0000</lastBuildDate>
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	<url>https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2020/05/16160320/cropped-mongabay_icon-32x32.png</url>
	<title>Hong Kong environmental news</title>
	<link>https://news.mongabay.com/list/hong-kong/</link>
	<width>32</width>
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				<item>
					<title>Urban heat islands have solutions; many tropical cities can’t afford them</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/urban-heat-islands-have-solutions-many-tropical-cities-cant-afford-them/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/urban-heat-islands-have-solutions-many-tropical-cities-cant-afford-them/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>13 Aug 2026 00:34:02 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Adam Litchkofski]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Glenn Scherer]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/08/12214622/5-1-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=326095</guid>

											<reporting-project>
							<![CDATA[Planetary Boundaries]]>
						</reporting-project>
					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Africa, Asia, China, East Asia, Global, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Jakarta, Nigeria, Singapore, Southeast Asia, Tropics, and West Africa]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Adaptation To Climate Change, Biodiversity, Cities, Climate, Climate Change, Climate Science, Conservation, Development, Disasters, Earth Science, Economics, El Nino, Energy, Environment, Extreme Weather, Fossil Fuels, Global Environmental Crisis, Health, Heatwave, Impact Of Climate Change, Infrastructure, Natural Resources, Planetary Boundaries, Planetary Health, Plants, Poverty, Public Health, Research, Science, Sustainability, Sustainable Development, Temperatures, Trees, Tropical Conservation Science, urban ecology, Weather, and Wildlife]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Urban heat islands pose a growing global health threat. But in tropical cities, the peril is surging. Already burdened by hot-humid equatorial weather, global warming, intense poverty, rapid urbanization, and a lack of cooling infrastructure, tropical city officials now face a powerful 2026-2027 El Niño that could put millions of vulnerable urban dwellers at risk. [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Urban heat islands pose a growing global health threat. But in tropical cities, the peril is surging. Already burdened by hot-humid equatorial weather, global warming, intense poverty, rapid urbanization, and a lack of cooling infrastructure, tropical city officials now face a powerful 2026-2027 El Niño that could put millions of vulnerable urban dwellers at risk. Heat islands form because artificial surfaces, like roads and rooftops, trap heat by day and release it by night, never giving highly-urbanized spaces time to cool. When climate change-induced heat domes stall over cities, temperatures can soar for weeks into the triple digits. Every “city has a rhythm, it has a metabolism,” Matthias Roth, a National University of Singapore researcher, told Mongabay in a video interview. “The metabolism of each city — especially how incoming solar energy is divided between heating surfaces, warming the air, evaporating water, and being stored in the ground and buildings — influences how much energy heats up buildings, surfaces, and air. The prevalence of concrete and asphalt and the absence of vegetation creates a heat island.” But not all tropical urban heat islands (UHIs) are created equally, with the severity of their heat burdens dependent on innovative city planning and the financial clout to keep pace with global warming. In wealthy Singapore (which has devoted high levels of funding to curb UHI effects), air temperatures can still swell; compact high-rise building complexes there can see outdoor temperatures 4.3° Celsius (7.9° Fahrenheit) above rural areas. But in poorer cities, like Lagos,&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/urban-heat-islands-have-solutions-many-tropical-cities-cant-afford-them/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/urban-heat-islands-have-solutions-many-tropical-cities-cant-afford-them/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-326095</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Nearly a million birds shipped from Africa to Asia in 15 years; canaries top the list</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/04/nearly-a-million-birds-shipped-from-africa-to-asia-in-15-years-canaries-top-the-list/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/04/nearly-a-million-birds-shipped-from-africa-to-asia-in-15-years-canaries-top-the-list/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>15 Apr 2026 15:04:39 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Spoorthy Raman]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Sharon Guynup]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2026/04/15120913/Photo-5-yfc-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=317571</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Africa, Asia, Atlantic Forest, Guinea, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Mali, Mozambique, North America, Senegal, Singapore, Southeast Asia, Tanzania, and West Africa]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Animals, Biodiversity, Birds, Conservation, Crime, Environment, Health, Invasive Species, Parrots, Pet Trade, Planetary Health, Public Health, Regulations, Wildlife, Wildlife Trade, Wildlife Trafficking, and Zoonotic Diseases]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Worldwide, people buy and hunt nearly half of the 11,000 bird species in existence. In Asia, Europe, and North and South America, songbirds and parrots are highly desired pets. Collectors pay exorbitant sums for rare species or melodious birds to compete in high-stakes singing competitions. Falconers and sport hunters capture or kill raptors. Belief-based rituals [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Worldwide, people buy and hunt nearly half of the 11,000 bird species in existence. In Asia, Europe, and North and South America, songbirds and parrots are highly desired pets. Collectors pay exorbitant sums for rare species or melodious birds to compete in high-stakes singing competitions. Falconers and sport hunters capture or kill raptors. Belief-based rituals in West Africa incorporate vulture parts. Buyers in North America seek dead hornbills and hummingbirds as home décor. The list goes on. This massive commerce threatens more than 200 avian species with extinction. Now, as online marketplaces proliferate, customers can order a bird with a swipe on their phone from anywhere on the planet. Moving birds around the world also spreads deadly diseases, from avian influenza to circovirus, and when non-native birds get loose, they may proliferate, outcompeting residents. “There&#8217;s a lack of awareness and appreciation for the scale of this trade, and little attention on the impacts that this could be having on wild populations or the risks for the spread of invasive species and infectious diseases,” said Rowan Martin, director of bird trade at the nonprofit World Parrot Trust. “If people are not aware that this is even happening, then how are we going to be able to mitigate the risks associated with it?” In an attempt to understand the scale of the live bird trade, Martin and his colleagues used records from U.N. Comtrade, a database that aggregates information on all commodities traded between countries. The team analyzed live bird imports into&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2026/04/nearly-a-million-birds-shipped-from-africa-to-asia-in-15-years-canaries-top-the-list/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2026/04/nearly-a-million-birds-shipped-from-africa-to-asia-in-15-years-canaries-top-the-list/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-317571</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Endangered humphead wrasse gets a lifeline from facial recognition tech</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/06/endangered-humphead-wrasse-gets-a-lifeline-from-facial-recognition-tech/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/06/endangered-humphead-wrasse-gets-a-lifeline-from-facial-recognition-tech/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>23 Jun 2025 21:01:12 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Spoorthy Raman]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Sharon Guynup]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/06/23132837/Pez_Napoleon_Cheilinus_undulatus_mar_Rojo_Egipto_2023-04-18_DD_13_cropped-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=301211</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[China, East Asia, Global, and Hong Kong]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Animals, Artificial Intelligence, Biodiversity, Conservation, Conservation Technology, Ecosystems, Endangered Species, Environment, Fish, Fisheries, Fishing, Food, Food Industry, Illegal Fishing, Marine, Marine Animals, Marine Conservation, Oceans, Overfishing, Saltwater Fish, Technology, and Wildtech]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Among the many spectacular reef fishes swimming the Indo-Pacific corals, from Africa to Oceania, is the big-eyed, bulge-faced, thick-lipped, blue-green humphead wrasse, also known as the Napoleon wrasse. It’s among the world’s largest reef fish, sought for its flavor and coveted as a status symbol meal in high-end Chinese cuisine. Overfishing remains the biggest threat [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Among the many spectacular reef fishes swimming the Indo-Pacific corals, from Africa to Oceania, is the big-eyed, bulge-faced, thick-lipped, blue-green humphead wrasse, also known as the Napoleon wrasse. It’s among the world’s largest reef fish, sought for its flavor and coveted as a status symbol meal in high-end Chinese cuisine. Overfishing remains the biggest threat to the species, Cheilinus undulatus, whose conservation status was assessed as vulnerable in 1996 on the IUCN Red List, and worsened to endangered in 2004. Juvenile and young adult humphead wrasses are sold alive to restaurants across Hong Kong and mainland China, as well as to expatriate Chinese communities around the world. Customers choose the fish for their meal from the wrasse swimming in large tanks, much like U.S. restaurant-goers choose a lobster for dinner. The humphead wrasse is extremely valuable: each fish can fetch up to $850. While there is a legal trade in the species, the high market value has also led to a booming illegal trade. Permits that allow shops and restaurants to keep legally caught wrasse are often misused to launder illegally traded fish, as there has been no way to identify individuals. Indonesia is the leading exporter of humphead wrasse. In a recent study, published in the journal Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution, researchers in Hong Kong announced a first-of-its-kind photo identification app for the humphead wrasse, called Saving Face. They developed this smartphone-based app, which uses artificial intelligence (AI), to identify individual humphead wrasses from photos. It pulls the&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/06/endangered-humphead-wrasse-gets-a-lifeline-from-facial-recognition-tech/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/06/endangered-humphead-wrasse-gets-a-lifeline-from-facial-recognition-tech/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-301211</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Amid fuzzy data, scientists urge monitoring of Hong Kong’s tokay gecko trade</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/04/amid-fuzzy-data-scientists-urge-monitoring-of-hong-kongs-tokay-gecko-trade/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/04/amid-fuzzy-data-scientists-urge-monitoring-of-hong-kongs-tokay-gecko-trade/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>03 Apr 2025 12:59:13 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Spoorthy Raman]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Isabel Esterman]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2025/04/03112948/bali_0003-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=297031</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, China, and Hong Kong]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Animals, Conservation, Crime, Endangered Species, Environment, Reptiles, Research, Traditional Chinese Medicine, Wildlife, Wildlife Trade, and Wildlife Trafficking]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Tokay geckos (Gekko gecko), named after their characteristic “to-kay” calls, are among the largest geckos in the world and inhabit rainforests and human-modified landscapes across South and Southeast Asia. As nature’s pest control, they are vital to the ecosystem, and their bright spots are favored in the pet trade. But for many humans, these colorful [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Tokay geckos (Gekko gecko), named after their characteristic “to-kay” calls, are among the largest geckos in the world and inhabit rainforests and human-modified landscapes across South and Southeast Asia. As nature’s pest control, they are vital to the ecosystem, and their bright spots are favored in the pet trade. But for many humans, these colorful lizards seem to be more valuable when dead, as their gutted, flattened and dried bodies are used in traditional Chinese medicine (TCM). “They&#8217;re sold in traditional Chinese medicine shops around the world,” says Chris Shepherd, executive director at the Monitor Conservation Research Society in Canada, who has studied the tokay gecko trade for more than a decade. Growing demand for tokay geckos in the TCM market, largely from mainland China and Hong Kong, has made them one of the most traded reptiles on the planet. “The volume of tokay geckos is terrifying. … They&#8217;re being traded in the millions,” Shepherd says. In a recent publication in the journal Integrative Conservation, Shepherd and his colleagues have raised concerns about the alarming trends in the trade of tokay geckos in Hong Kong, which is among the largest importers of the species. They cite two independent surveys published in 2024 that looked at how widely tokay geckos were sold in Hong Kong’s TCM pharmacies. A 2021 survey of 169 shops and clinics found tokay geckos sold in 59% of them, while a 2022 survey led by Shepherd found the lizards sold in 37% of 150 shops. A tokay&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2025/04/amid-fuzzy-data-scientists-urge-monitoring-of-hong-kongs-tokay-gecko-trade/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2025/04/amid-fuzzy-data-scientists-urge-monitoring-of-hong-kongs-tokay-gecko-trade/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-297031</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Hong Kong as a reef fish haven? These scientists want to get the word out</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2024/02/hong-kong-as-a-reef-fish-haven-these-scientists-want-to-get-the-word-out/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2024/02/hong-kong-as-a-reef-fish-haven-these-scientists-want-to-get-the-word-out/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>22 Feb 2024 18:13:51 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Elizabeth Claire Alberts]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Elizabethalberts]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2024/02/22130735/hong-kong-reef-fish-1-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=279079</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, China, East Asia, and Hong Kong]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Animals, Biodiversity, Citizen Science, Coastal Ecosystems, Conservation, Coral Reefs, Ecosystems, Education, Environment, Fish, Marine, Marine Animals, Marine Conservation, Oceans, and Saltwater Fish]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Kamy Yeung said she wanted to do more scuba diving. So in 2014, she signed up to be a volunteer diver for a newly launched reef fish survey project in Hong Kong. The experience changed everything she knew about the underwater world. “Like many other Hong Kongers, I was under the impression that we don&#8217;t [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Kamy Yeung said she wanted to do more scuba diving. So in 2014, she signed up to be a volunteer diver for a newly launched reef fish survey project in Hong Kong. The experience changed everything she knew about the underwater world. “Like many other Hong Kongers, I was under the impression that we don&#8217;t get to see [many fish] in the Hong Kong waters,” Yeung, a secondary school teacher, told Mongabay. “I always thought I had to go overseas to see different kinds of fish. But now I know that we actually have lots of biodiversity in the Hong Kong waters.” The project, a citizen science program known as 114°E Hong Kong Reef Fish Survey and now in its 10th year, is the creation of Stanley Shea, a marine scientist and conservationist who acts as the marine program director for the NGO BLOOM Association Hong Kong. He started the project after recognizing how little had been done to survey reef fish in the island city’s waters, despite the importance of seafood for local consumption and trade. Yvonne Sadovy, a biologist who taught at the University of Hong Kong for many years and once advised Shea on his master&#8217;s project, is very familiar with this issue. “Most students only ever had access to dead [fish] in marketplaces, so they didn&#8217;t perceive these animals as wildlife in a sense,” Sadovy told Mongabay about her former students. “Now I know that we actually have lots of biodiversity in the Hong Kong waters,”&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2024/02/hong-kong-as-a-reef-fish-haven-these-scientists-want-to-get-the-word-out/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2024/02/hong-kong-as-a-reef-fish-haven-these-scientists-want-to-get-the-word-out/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-279079</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Restoring Hong Kong’s oyster reefs, one abandoned oyster farm at a time</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2022/12/restoring-hong-kongs-oyster-reefs-one-abandoned-oyster-farm-at-a-time/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2022/12/restoring-hong-kongs-oyster-reefs-one-abandoned-oyster-farm-at-a-time/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>30 Dec 2022 06:00:16 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Peter Yeung]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Rebecca Kessler]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Food systems]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2022/12/29075946/Anniqa-Law-Chung-kiu-conservation-project-manager-for-The-Nature-Conservancy-Hong-Kong-credit-Peter-Yeung-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=264210</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, China, East Asia, and Hong Kong]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Animals, Biodiversity, Coastal Ecosystems, Conservation, Ecosystems, Environment, Fish, Food, Food Industry, food security, Marine, Marine Animals, Marine Conservation, Ocean Warming, Oceans, Restoration, Traditional Knowledge, and Wildlife]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[HONG KONG — Thousands of grayish, oval-shaped oysters pepper the mudflats of far northern Hong Kong, clustering together on fragments of rock lining the shoreline or clamping onto abandoned concrete posts. Despite being stuck in between a proverbial rock and a hard place — the bustling megalopolis of Hong Kong sprawling behind and the spiky [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[HONG KONG — Thousands of grayish, oval-shaped oysters pepper the mudflats of far northern Hong Kong, clustering together on fragments of rock lining the shoreline or clamping onto abandoned concrete posts. Despite being stuck in between a proverbial rock and a hard place — the bustling megalopolis of Hong Kong sprawling behind and the spiky skyline of Shenzhen and its 17 million inhabitants just across the water — the area is rippling with activity. Crabs scamper between shells and burrow holes underground; mud hoppers splash between the brackish puddles left by the low tide; and birds zip between branches of mangroves that thrive in this uniquely urban environment. “You can see that this place is full of life,” says Anniqa Law Chung-kiu, conservation project manager for The Nature Conservancy (TNC) Hong Kong, as she carefully treads through the watery mud. “The oyster reef is playing an important role in the local ecosystem.” Oysters growing at Pak Nai, Hong Kong. Image by Peter Yeung for Mongabay. Mangroves at Pak Nai. Image by Peter Yeung for Mongabay. The reef she speaks of is new, one of several her team fashioned from the old posts in the mudflats off Pak Nai, a historic hamlet along Deep Bay in Hong Kong’s northern New Territories region. These diverse habitats provide homes for fish and other marine life. Their creation has opened up space for horseshoe crabs, an endangered species dating back 475 million years. They stabilize shorelines in a way that both mitigates coastal erosion&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2022/12/restoring-hong-kongs-oyster-reefs-one-abandoned-oyster-farm-at-a-time/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-264210</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Alleged macaque-smuggling ring exposed as U.S. indicts Cambodian officials</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2022/11/alleged-macaque-smuggling-ring-exposed-as-u-s-indicts-cambodian-officials/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2022/11/alleged-macaque-smuggling-ring-exposed-as-u-s-indicts-cambodian-officials/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>18 Nov 2022 07:33:04 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Gerald Flynn]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Isabel Esterman]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2022/11/18054548/Cropped-troupe-of-LTMs-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=262745</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Cambodia, Hong Kong, New York, Southeast Asia, and United States]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Animal Welfare, Animals, Biodiversity, Conservation, Corporate Environmental Transgressors, Corporate Social Responsibility, Corporations, Corruption, Crime, Deforestation, Developing Countries, Ecosystems, Endangered Species, Endangered Species Act, Environment, Extinction, Forest Destruction, Forest Loss, Habitat Degradation, Habitat Loss, Human-wildlife Conflict, Illegal Trade, Lacey Act, Law Enforcement, Medicine, Monkeys, Organized Crime, Poaching, Primates, Protected Areas, Rainforests, Saving Species From Extinction, Solutions, Tropical Deforestation, Tropical Forests, Wildlife, Wildlife Trade, and Wildlife Trafficking]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[PHNOM PENH — Eight people, including two Cambodian Forestry Administration officials, have been charged by U.S. federal prosecutors for their alleged involvement in an international monkey smuggling ring. One of the officials charged, Kry Masphal, was arrested at New York City&#8217;s John F. Kennedy International Airport, en route to Panama, where he was to have [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[PHNOM PENH — Eight people, including two Cambodian Forestry Administration officials, have been charged by U.S. federal prosecutors for their alleged involvement in an international monkey smuggling ring. One of the officials charged, Kry Masphal, was arrested at New York City&#8217;s John F. Kennedy International Airport, en route to Panama, where he was to have represented Cambodia at an international conference on the global wildlife trade. In a Nov. 16 press statement, the U.S. Department of Justice announced that as many as 3,000 wild long-tailed macaques (Macaca fascicularis) have been laundered through Vanny Bio Research’s facilities in Cambodia since at least December 2017. Cambodian Forestry Administration officials allegedly received cash payments for each animal captured in the wild and then created fake papers from CITES, the global convention on the wildlife trade, that mislabeled the long-tailed macaques as captive-bred monkeys. The two officials, Masphal and Keo Omaliss, have both worked as CITES representatives for Cambodia, with Omaliss also serving as director-general of the Forestry Administration, while Masphal works beneath him as deputy director of the Forestry Administration’s Department of Wildlife and Biodiversity. Both were named in a 27-page indictment from the U.S. Attorney’s Office in the Southern District of Florida that was unsealed after Masphal’s Nov. 16 arrest as he was headed to the CITES conference in Panama. Cambodia&#8217;s population of the endangered long-tailed macaque remains unknown to researchers, but they are typically found across the country. Photo by Gerald Flynn/Mongabay. Also charged were James Man Sang Lau, founder and&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2022/11/alleged-macaque-smuggling-ring-exposed-as-u-s-indicts-cambodian-officials/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2022/11/alleged-macaque-smuggling-ring-exposed-as-u-s-indicts-cambodian-officials/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-262745</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Colorful new corals bedeck the busy waters off Hong Kong, study shows</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2022/07/colorful-new-corals-bedeck-the-busy-waters-off-hong-kong-study-shows/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2022/07/colorful-new-corals-bedeck-the-busy-waters-off-hong-kong-study-shows/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>11 Jul 2022 14:24:11 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Liz Kimbrough]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Liz Kimbrough]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2022/07/11140504/Tubastraea-dendroida-1-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=258126</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, China, East Asia, and Hong Kong]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Animals, Biodiversity, Coral Reefs, Ecosystems, Environment, Marine, Marine Animals, New Discovery, Oceans, Research, Science, and Species Discovery]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[In the eastern waters off Hong Kong, a group of scientists searching for coral-eating nudibranchs stumbled upon a colorful surprise: three new species of sun corals. These orange, purple and green corals belong to the genus Tubastraea, bringing the known members of this coral group from seven species to 10. “Given that corals are one [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[In the eastern waters off Hong Kong, a group of scientists searching for coral-eating nudibranchs stumbled upon a colorful surprise: three new species of sun corals. These orange, purple and green corals belong to the genus Tubastraea, bringing the known members of this coral group from seven species to 10. “Given that corals are one of the best-studied marine animals, our study reveals how little we know about marine diversity, and how many undescribed species are still awaiting our discovery,” said Qiu Jianwen, a professor at Hong Kong Baptist University who, along with master’s student Yiu King-fung, found the corals. The sun coral Tubastraea chloromura. (Left) Close-up of a corallite with extended tentacles. (Right) Close-up of the skeleton of a corallite. Image courtesy of Yiu et al. (2022). Descriptions of the new corals, found around the Sung Kong and Waglan islands have been published in the journal Zoological Studies. Unlike the colorful corals most people are familiar with, sun coral species don’t build reefs or host symbiotic algae. Instead, they live in deeper waters (10 to 30 meters, or 33-98 feet, below the water’s surface) and eat by capturing zooplankton from seawater with their tentacles. The bright-orange Tubastraea dendroida is named for its unique tree-like branching shape. Tubastraea chloromura draws its name from its olive-green skeletal wall, with “chloro” meaning green and “murus” meaning wall. And Tubastraea violacea, so named for its violet color, may have color variants, such as a yellow variant in the South Pacific, according to DNA&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2022/07/colorful-new-corals-bedeck-the-busy-waters-off-hong-kong-study-shows/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-258126</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Hospital waste, not masks, are plastic scourge of pandemic: Study</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2021/11/hospital-waste-not-masks-are-plastic-scourge-of-pandemic-study-finds-study/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2021/11/hospital-waste-not-masks-are-plastic-scourge-of-pandemic-study-finds-study/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>12 Nov 2021 18:52:46 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Elizabeth Claire Alberts]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Elizabethalberts]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2021/11/12183107/50218042482_c48a47f02d_k-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=249419</guid>

											<reporting-project>
							<![CDATA[Covering the Commons and Planetary Boundaries]]>
						</reporting-project>
					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Europe, Hong Kong, and North America]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Air Pollution, Animals, Biodiversity, Climate, Climate Change, Conservation, Ecosystems, Global Environmental Crisis, Marine, Marine Animals, Marine Conservation, Microplastics, Oceans, Plastic, Pollution, and Water Pollution]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[The disposable face mask has become the poster child for COVID-19-related waste since the start of the pandemic, showing up on beaches and in waterways all over the world. Hong Kong is no exception. Just a few weeks after the first cases hit the city, face masks started appearing in the ocean and washing onto [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[The disposable face mask has become the poster child for COVID-19-related waste since the start of the pandemic, showing up on beaches and in waterways all over the world. Hong Kong is no exception. Just a few weeks after the first cases hit the city, face masks started appearing in the ocean and washing onto beaches, says Gary Stokes of Hong Kong-based NGO OceansAsia. “You can go down into the main bit of Hong Kong Harbor, be waiting for a ferry or looking over the promenade, and you&#8217;ll just see them floating past,” Stokes told Mongabay in a phone interview. “Then you can go all the way out to &#8230; the Soko Islands, which is remote and … away from everybody, and you still find them there.” But discarded face masks are only the most noticeable form of pandemic-related plastic waste impacting the marine environment. A new study published this week in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) found that pandemic-related hospital waste — plastic sheets, bottles, syringes and gloves — posed a far greater threat than the 1.56 billion face masks estimated to have already made their way into the oceans. Gary Stokes of OceansAsia holding up an array of discarded face masks found on a Hong Kong beach. Image by OceansAsia. The study used modeling to find that 193 countries produced more than 8 million metric tons of pandemic-related plastic waste since the start of the COVID-19 outbreak. About 26,000 tons of this waste is said to&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2021/11/hospital-waste-not-masks-are-plastic-scourge-of-pandemic-study-finds-study/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-249419</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>New bill seeks to end Hong Kong’s days as an illegal wildlife trade hub</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2021/05/new-bill-seeks-to-end-hong-kongs-days-as-an-illegal-wildlife-trade-hub/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2021/05/new-bill-seeks-to-end-hong-kongs-days-as-an-illegal-wildlife-trade-hub/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>26 May 2021 19:51:17 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Elizabeth Claire Alberts]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Elizabethalberts]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2021/05/26110919/03-Must-credit_-Paul-Hilton-for-Earth-Tree-Images-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=243022</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Hong Kong]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Animals, Conservation, Crime, Illegal Trade, International Trade, Law, Law Enforcement, Organized Crime, Trade, trafficking, Wildlife, Wildlife Trade, and Wildlife Trafficking]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[In 2019, Hong Kong customs authorities inspected a cargo ship bound for Vietnam. Hidden beneath slabs of frozen meat were 8.3 metric tons of illegal scales from about 13,800 pangolins, and more than 2.1 metric tons of tusks from about 200 elephants, with a combined value of about $8 million. This was one of the [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[In 2019, Hong Kong customs authorities inspected a cargo ship bound for Vietnam. Hidden beneath slabs of frozen meat were 8.3 metric tons of illegal scales from about 13,800 pangolins, and more than 2.1 metric tons of tusks from about 200 elephants, with a combined value of about $8 million. This was one of the largest wildlife seizures in Hong Kong history, but far from an isolated incident. In 2018 and 2019, Hong Kong authorities confiscated more than 649 metric tons of illegal wildlife and wildlife products across 1,404 seizures, according to a new report by Hong Kong’s ADM Capital Foundation (ADMCF). Wildlife crime is so rampant in Hong Kong that its wildlife seizures for 2019 equated to about a third of all wildlife seizures in mainland China — a jurisdiction more than 866% the size of Hong Kong and with about 1.4 billion more people living in it. While many of these seizures resulted in prosecution and conviction, some of the biggest cases — including the 2019 pangolin and ivory seizure — have gone unpunished, possibly due to a lack of evidence. The report also notes that authorities haven’t laid any money-laundering charges for the 2,542 wildlife trafficking cases seen in Hong Kong between 2015 and 2019, despite these seizures amounting to 1,900 metric tons of wildlife worth a combined $73 million. A new bill may change all of this. Legal experts have put forward a draft law that would allow wildlife crimes to be dealt with under Hong&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2021/05/new-bill-seeks-to-end-hong-kongs-days-as-an-illegal-wildlife-trade-hub/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-243022</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Efforts to tackle shark fin trade need to focus closer to shore, study says</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2020/10/efforts-to-tackle-shark-fin-trade-need-to-focus-closer-to-shore-study-says/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2020/10/efforts-to-tackle-shark-fin-trade-need-to-focus-closer-to-shore-study-says/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>28 Oct 2020 12:49:37 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Elizabeth Claire Alberts]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Elizabethalberts]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2020/10/28122853/Palumbi_fins_seizure-768x512.jpeg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=236280</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Australia, Brazil, Canada, Hong Kong, Mexico, and United States]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Animals, Biodiversity, Conservation, Elasmobranchs, Environment, Fish, Fisheries, Global Environmental Crisis, Green, International Trade, Marine, Marine Animals, Marine Conservation, Oceans, shark finning, Sharks, Trade, Wildlife, Wildlife Trade, and Wildlife Trafficking]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[A hunger for shark fin soup — a brothy, gelatinous dish that’s considered a delicacy in East Asia — is responsible for the deaths of about 73 million sharks each year. It was previously believed that many of these sharks were being caught in international waters, beyond the authority of any individual country, but a new [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[A hunger for shark fin soup — a brothy, gelatinous dish that’s considered a delicacy in East Asia — is responsible for the deaths of about 73 million sharks each year. It was previously believed that many of these sharks were being caught in international waters, beyond the authority of any individual country, but a new study has upended this assumption: it found that fins were actually coming from sharks present in coastal waters, within countries’ exclusive economic zones. “It definitely gives us new information we didn&#8217;t have before … [and] repositions where the problem is occurring,” lead author Kyle Van Houtan, chief scientist at Monterey Bay Aquarium, told Mongabay. “But it also may give us some challenges that we didn&#8217;t realize we had.” Each country or jurisdiction has its own rules regarding the capture, trade and sale of shark fins. While many have outwardly banned the practice of shark finning — which involves slicing the fins off a shark, often while still alive, and then discarding the body — it can still be legal to take and sell fins from a shark that has been legally fished. And while some sharks can be legally traded across international borders, the trade of other species is either strictly regulated or prohibited. Shark fins being sorted outside a shop in Hong Kong. Image by OceansAsia. But once fins have been skinned, dried and bleached in preparation for sale, it’s difficult to distinguish which species they came from, and whether they were acquired legally or illegally.&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2020/10/efforts-to-tackle-shark-fin-trade-need-to-focus-closer-to-shore-study-says/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-236280</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Mercury with that? Shark fins served with illegal doses of heavy metals</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2020/06/mercury-with-that-shark-fins-served-with-illegal-doses-of-heavy-metals/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2020/06/mercury-with-that-shark-fins-served-with-illegal-doses-of-heavy-metals/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>19 Jun 2020 13:01:14 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Elizabeth Claire Alberts]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Elizabethalberts]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2020/06/19062201/1-1-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=231599</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, China, and Hong Kong]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Animals, Elasmobranchs, Health, Illegal Trade, International Trade, Marine, Marine Animals, Mercury, Oceans, shark finning, Sharks, and Wildlife Trade]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Shark fin soup is said to be the food of emperors, but a new study finds this “luxury” dish may not be so favorable to the person who eats it. A team of international researchers discovered that shark fins contain high levels of mercury — in most cases, much higher than what’s legally considered safe [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Shark fin soup is said to be the food of emperors, but a new study finds this “luxury” dish may not be so favorable to the person who eats it. A team of international researchers discovered that shark fins contain high levels of mercury — in most cases, much higher than what’s legally considered safe for human consumption. Shark fin soup has a long history in Chinese culture. Emperor Taizu of the Northern Song, who ruled China between 960 and 976, apparently ate shark fin soup to display his power and wealth. From that point on, the dish became a status symbol and much-sought-after food item in China, served throughout the Song dynasty (960-1279), the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644), and the Qing Dynasty (1644-1912). While it briefly disappeared from the menu when the Chinese Communist Party assumed power in 1949, it reemerged in the 1980s as a dish to signify prosperity and good fortune. Shark fin soup. Image by Wikipedia / Creative Commons. Even today, shark fin soup continues to be a popular food choice in China and Hong Kong, and there’s even a growing demand in other Asian countries like Thailand, Vietnam and Indonesia. In Hong Kong, it’s frequently served as a delicacy at weddings and New Year’s banquets, but you can also find “everyday” versions of the soup at most restaurants. To feed the insatiable demand for shark fin soup, about 100 million sharks are killed every year, according to one study. While it’s legal to trade the fins&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2020/06/mercury-with-that-shark-fins-served-with-illegal-doses-of-heavy-metals/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-231599</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Caught on camera: Rare finless porpoises sighted in Hong Kong waters</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2020/06/caught-on-camera-rare-finless-porpoises-sighted-in-hong-kong-waters/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2020/06/caught-on-camera-rare-finless-porpoises-sighted-in-hong-kong-waters/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>08 Jun 2020 07:42:28 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Elizabeth Claire Alberts]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Elizabethalberts]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2020/06/08071051/FP5-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=231113</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Hong Kong]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Animals, Cetaceans, Endangered Species, Marine, Marine Animals, Marine Mammals, Marine Protected Areas, Oceans, and Videos]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Two silvery-white porpoises glide through the ocean, captured in the lens of a drone camera. The pair swim side by side, occasionally surfacing for a quick breath of air. After a few minutes, they’re joined by several other porpoises, and the group travels together before disappearing into deeper waters. This is the first drone video [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Two silvery-white porpoises glide through the ocean, captured in the lens of a drone camera. The pair swim side by side, occasionally surfacing for a quick breath of air. After a few minutes, they’re joined by several other porpoises, and the group travels together before disappearing into deeper waters. This is the first drone video ever recorded of the rare and very elusive Indo-Pacific finless porpoise (Neophocaena phocaenoides) in Hong Kong, says Gary Stokes, director of Oceans Asia, a Hong Kong-based marine conservation group. “I made it my personal holy grail to get footage of these porpoise as they are so hard to document and no one has anything decent,” Stokes told Mongabay. “Everyone I spoke with working on them in Hong Kong has little to no images. The best pictures resemble a ‘floating tire,’ which is as best as you can really get if you are really lucky.” But Stokes said he got extremely lucky when he went out on his boat to search for them off the coast of South Lantau Island on May 2. “At one point I had 9 to 10 animals, which is said to be about as large a pod as they get, and very uncommon in Hong Kong,” he said. The finless porpoise is a small, bathtub-sized creature with a distinctive attribute: unlike many other cetaceans, it only has a small dorsal ridge on its back, rather than a proper dorsal fin. This trait gives the finless porpoise its name, and makes it&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2020/06/caught-on-camera-rare-finless-porpoises-sighted-in-hong-kong-waters/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-231113</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Authorities seize record 26 tons of illegal shark fins in Hong Kong</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2020/05/authorities-seize-record-26-tons-of-illegal-shark-fins-in-hong-kong/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2020/05/authorities-seize-record-26-tons-of-illegal-shark-fins-in-hong-kong/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>07 May 2020 11:39:03 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Elizabeth Claire Alberts]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Elizabethalberts]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2020/05/07112252/P2020050600631_photo_1172227-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=229986</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Hong Kong]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Endangered Species, Illegal Trade, shark finning, Sharks, Trade, trafficking, Wildlife Trade, and Wildlife Trafficking]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Customs officials in Hong Kong have seized 26 tons of shark fins from an estimated 38,500 sharks classified as vulnerable and protected species — the biggest shipment ever to be intercepted in the region, according to a press release published May 6. This is more than double the amount of all fins seized in 31 [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Customs officials in Hong Kong have seized 26 tons of shark fins from an estimated 38,500 sharks classified as vulnerable and protected species — the biggest shipment ever to be intercepted in the region, according to a press release published May 6. This is more than double the amount of all fins seized in 31 shipments in Hong Kong in 2019, which totaled 12 tons. This recent shipment, which came from Ecuador, is valued at HK$8.6 million ($1.1 million), Danny Cheung Kwok-yin, divisional commander of marine investigation at Hong Kong Customs, told Mongabay. HK customs officials, including Danny Cheung Kwok-yin (center), standing in front of the 26 tons of shark fins seized in Hong Kong in early May 2020. Image by HK Customs. An official from the Agriculture Fisheries and Conservation Department (AFCD) identified the shipment to contain fins from 31,000 thresher sharks (Alopias vulpinus) and 7,500 silky sharks (Carcharhinus falciformis), which are both listed as vulnerable species by the IUCN and protected by CITES, an international treaty to prevent the illegal trade in endangered animals and plants. There was also a small portion of fins from species that are not protected under CITES, and these may have been used for cover, Cheung said. The shark fins were packed into 773 nylon bags and stowed in two containers, Cheung said. The customs declaration stated that the containers held “pescado seco,” meaning “dried fish,” but the fact that it was written in Spanish roused suspicion since English is normally used on&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2020/05/authorities-seize-record-26-tons-of-illegal-shark-fins-in-hong-kong/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-229986</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>DNA detective work reveals where in the ocean shark fins came from</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2020/05/dna-detective-work-reveals-where-in-the-ocean-shark-fins-came-from/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2020/05/dna-detective-work-reveals-where-in-the-ocean-shark-fins-came-from/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>07 May 2020 04:12:31 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Elizabeth Claire Alberts]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Elizabethalberts]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2020/05/07035922/UChrobak-SBennett_FinBan_3Fins-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=229954</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Hong Kong]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Animals, DNA, Global Environmental Crisis, Illegal Trade, Marine, Marine Animals, Marine Conservation, Oceans, shark finning, Sharks, Wildlife, Wildlife Trade, and Wildlife Trafficking]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[In 2013, Demian Chapman ambled down the streets in the Sheung Wan district in Hong Kong, where thousands of yellowed shark fins were drying on the sidewalk, or packed in clear plastic bags, ready for a quick sale. “I saw more sharks in the form of fins on the street in one afternoon than I [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[In 2013, Demian Chapman ambled down the streets in the Sheung Wan district in Hong Kong, where thousands of yellowed shark fins were drying on the sidewalk, or packed in clear plastic bags, ready for a quick sale. “I saw more sharks in the form of fins on the street in one afternoon than I had in an entire career working in the ocean,” Chapman, a scientist at Florida International University, told Mongabay. “I asked myself, ‘What can I do as a geneticist to unlock this trade?&#8217;” Shark fins being dried on the street in Hong Kong. Image by Ocean Asia. As many as 73 million sharks end up in the global shark fin trade each year, with the fish being killed 30 times faster than they can reproduce, according to a report by the Washington, D.C.-based NGO Oceana. Fishermen mainly target sharks for their fins, which are used to make shark fin soup, a luxury food item that can fetch exorbitant prices. The fins are so valuable, it’s become a common practice for fishermen to cut off the fins from a living shark, then throw the animal back into the water, where the sharks, unable to swim, will slowly drown. More than 70% of the fins that end up in Hong Kong come from vulnerable or endangered species, including scalloped hammerheads (Sphyrna lewini), great hammerheads (Sphyrna mokarran), and oceanic whitetips (Carcharhinus longimanus), despite the fact that they’re protected by CITES, an international treaty used to prevent endangered animals and&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2020/05/dna-detective-work-reveals-where-in-the-ocean-shark-fins-came-from/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-229954</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Wild orchid trade in China is huge, overlooked and ‘devastating,’ study finds</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2019/08/wild-orchid-trade-in-china-is-huge-overlooked-and-devastating-study-finds/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2019/08/wild-orchid-trade-in-china-is-huge-overlooked-and-devastating-study-finds/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>21 Aug 2019 11:16:38 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Shreya Dasgupta]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Shreya Dasgupta]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2019/08/21085054/Dendrobium_aphyllum_-_panoramio-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=221501</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, China, and Hong Kong]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Biodiversity, Conservation, Endangered Species, Environment, Forests, Green, Illegal Trade, Orchids, Plants, Research, Trade, Tropical Forests, and Wildlife]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[If you’re looking to buy orchids from plant markets in southern China, chances are you’ll find plenty of orchids that have been collected from the wild, sometimes illegally. And these vibrant wild orchids are usually priced much cheaper than those grown in nurseries, according to a new study. Researchers have found trade in more than [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[If you’re looking to buy orchids from plant markets in southern China, chances are you’ll find plenty of orchids that have been collected from the wild, sometimes illegally. And these vibrant wild orchids are usually priced much cheaper than those grown in nurseries, according to a new study. Researchers have found trade in more than 400 species of orchids collected from the wild, involving more than 1.2 million individuals, potentially worth more than $14.6 million — all in just one year of survey. “The results of this study are devastating,” Jacob Phelps, a lecturer at Lancaster University and co-chair of the IUCN SSC Orchid Specialist Group &#8211; Global Trade Programme, who was not involved in the study, told Mongabay. “We already knew that there was illegal trade of wild orchids in China, but this is our first real insight into the huge scale and richness of that trade.” Orchids, popular as ornamental plants and used in traditional medicine and food, are traded widely across the world. They also represent the single largest group of flora or fauna for which international trade is regulated: all 29,000-odd species of known orchids have been listed on Appendix I or Appendix II of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES). According to official data reported to the CITES, nearly all global commercial orchid trade involves artificially propagated plants. However, a number of studies have revealed that the trade in wild-sourced orchids, mostly undeclared and undocumented, may in fact be much greater than&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2019/08/wild-orchid-trade-in-china-is-huge-overlooked-and-devastating-study-finds/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-221501</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Researchers and customs officials unite to fight wildlife trafficking using eDNA</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2019/06/researchers-and-customs-officials-unite-to-fight-wildlife-trafficking-using-edna/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2019/06/researchers-and-customs-officials-unite-to-fight-wildlife-trafficking-using-edna/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>06 Jun 2019 13:18:07 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[David Klinges]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Sue Palminteri]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2019/06/06104426/glass-eels-768x512.jpeg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=219223</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[East Asia and Hong Kong]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Animals, Crime, data, DNA, Environment, Environmental Law, Environmental Policy, Fish, Genetics, Law Enforcement, Marine, Marine Animals, Migration, Portable, Trade, Wildlife Trade, Wildlife Trafficking, and Wildtech]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Diego Cardeñosa wasn’t expecting any work calls on a Saturday, and certainly not one from the Hong Kong Customs and Excise Department. The urgency of the matter, however, became quickly apparent. &#8220;Diego, there&#8217;s two smugglers here, we need your help. Can you come to the airport&#8230;now?” Cardeñosa, a PhD candidate in marine biology at Stony [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Diego Cardeñosa wasn’t expecting any work calls on a Saturday, and certainly not one from the Hong Kong Customs and Excise Department. The urgency of the matter, however, became quickly apparent. &#8220;Diego, there&#8217;s two smugglers here, we need your help. Can you come to the airport&#8230;now?” Cardeñosa, a PhD candidate in marine biology at Stony Brook University in New York, United States, grabbed a set of test tubes from his refrigerator, the suitcase next to the TV, and hopped on the next train to the airport. Once there, the customs officials laid out why they called: two men arriving from Portugal had carried with them bags of baby eels&#8211;tens of thousands of them in total. They needed to determine if these were legal shipments of American eels, or illegal transport of the endangered European Eel, Anguilla anguilla. Cardeñosa’s DNA test kit was just what they needed. Thousands of confiscated juvenile European eels (Anguilla anguilla), called glass eels as they are transparent Image courtesy of the Sustainable Eel Group (SEG) 2018. “So I arrived to the airport, we tested the eels, and the protocol told us it was European eels,” Cardeñosa told Mongabay. “They were able to detain the smugglers, and we actually made the first prosecution of an international smuggler trying to bring European eels into Hong Kong.” Later genetic sequencing performed on the shipment of eels confirmed this result, thereby validating this test for eel identification, developed by Cardeñosa and collaborators at the Florida International University, as a rapid&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2019/06/researchers-and-customs-officials-unite-to-fight-wildlife-trafficking-using-edna/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-219223</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Laurel Chor on photojournalism and Hong Kong&#8217;s &#8216;incredible biodiversity&#8217;</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2019/05/laurel-chor-on-photojournalism-and-hong-kongs-incredible-biodiversity/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2019/05/laurel-chor-on-photojournalism-and-hong-kongs-incredible-biodiversity/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>22 May 2019 14:44:26 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Erik Hoffner]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Erik Hoffner]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2019/05/22141459/Laurel-Chor-1-768x512.png" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=218830</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, China, East Asia, and Hong Kong]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Biodiversity, Cities, Education, Environment, Interviews, Journalism, and Photos]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Laurel Chor is a Hong Kong-based photojournalist and filmmaker. A National Geographic Explorer, Ambassador for the Jane Goodall Institute-Hong Kong, and founder of Hong Kong Explorers Initiative, she will be speaking during Ecosperity Week at a special edition of Ecosperity Conversations on June 7 in Singapore, and is a judge for Shoot for Sustainability, a [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Laurel Chor is a Hong Kong-based photojournalist and filmmaker. A National Geographic Explorer, Ambassador for the Jane Goodall Institute-Hong Kong, and founder of Hong Kong Explorers Initiative, she will be speaking during Ecosperity Week at a special edition of Ecosperity Conversations on June 7 in Singapore, and is a judge for Shoot for Sustainability, a regional photo competition organized by National Geographic and Temasek. Erik Hoffner for Mongabay: Hong Kong is a city of 7.3 million and isn’t known for its biodiversity, but rather for its steel and concrete. Yet there is a good amount of undeveloped land, can you describe its natural heritage? Laurel Chor: Hong Kong harbors an incredible biodiversity, with many endemic species living in its forests and rivers, while pink-hued Chinese white dolphins and finless porpoises swim in its waters. The city has more coral species than the Caribbean and more reef fish species than Hawaii. Only a quarter of the land is developed, while an eye-boggling 40% is protected, with an additional five marine parks on top of the vast country parks. The best part is that much of these wild areas are easily accessible to the public by train, bus, car or ferry. Western lowland gorillas in the Central African Republic. Image courtesy of Laurel Chor. Did exposure to the city&#8217;s nature spur your early interest in the environment? As a child, I never had much exposure to nature in Hong Kong. Before I was born, my parents immigrated to Canada and I spent the&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2019/05/laurel-chor-on-photojournalism-and-hong-kongs-incredible-biodiversity/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-218830</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Seahorse trade continues despite export bans, study finds</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2019/03/seahorse-trade-continues-despite-export-bans-study-finds/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2019/03/seahorse-trade-continues-despite-export-bans-study-finds/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>08 Mar 2019 05:31:42 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Shreya Dasgupta]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Shreya Dasgupta]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2019/03/08022720/dried-seahorses-in-Hong-Kong_Photo_Tyler_Stiem_PS-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=216298</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, China, East Asia, Hong Kong, India, Philippines, South Asia, Southeast Asia, Thailand, and Vietnam]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Animals, Biodiversity, Conservation, Environment, Green, Marine, Marine Animals, Marine Conservation, Oceans, Research, Seahorses, Wildlife, Wildlife Trade, and Wildlife Trafficking]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Seahorses continue to be traded in large volumes, despite many source countries imposing bans on exports of the animals, a new study has found. While some of these peculiarly shaped fishes with horse-like heads and prehensile tails are sold live to be showcased in aquariums, the majority are traded in their dried forms, mainly to be [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Seahorses continue to be traded in large volumes, despite many source countries imposing bans on exports of the animals, a new study has found. While some of these peculiarly shaped fishes with horse-like heads and prehensile tails are sold live to be showcased in aquariums, the majority are traded in their dried forms, mainly to be used in traditional Chinese medicines. Between 2004 and 2011, for instance, dried seahorses made up 98 percent of the reported 3.3 million to 7.6 million individual seahorses that were traded. Around 3 million to 5 million of these seahorses were imported by Hong Kong alone. All known species of seahorses (Hippocampus spp.), however, are subject to trade restrictions. In 2002, these tiny animals were added to Appendix II of CITES (Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora), which means only those seahorses that are sourced sustainably and legally can be exported. However, instead of regulating the trade, many countries that previously exported seahorses, such as India, the Philippines and Indonesia, banned the exports outright. Even Thailand, once the world’s largest exporter of dried seahorses, imposed a ban starting January 2016. “This meant that the countries historically responsible for 98% of reported seahorse exports by volume now had self- or CITES-imposed export bans on wild dried seahorses,” said Sarah Foster, lead author of the study published in Marine Policy, and a research associate with the Canada-based Project Seahorse. To see if these bans were being enforced, Foster and her colleagues turned to Hong Kong, the world’s&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2019/03/seahorse-trade-continues-despite-export-bans-study-finds/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-216298</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>DNA test helps officials spot dodgy shark shipments</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2018/12/dna-test-helps-officials-spot-dodgy-shark-shipments/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2018/12/dna-test-helps-officials-spot-dodgy-shark-shipments/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>21 Dec 2018 11:21:31 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Sue Palminteri (1965-2019)]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Sue Palminteri]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2018/12/21104550/thresher-shark_Rafn-Ingi-Finnsson_Flickr-CC2.0-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=213916</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Global and Hong Kong]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Crime, DNA, Illegal Trade, Law Enforcement, Oceans, Portable, Sharks, Technology, Wildlife Trade, Wildlife Trafficking, and Wildtech]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[A multi-national research team has developed a rapid DNA identification method to help customs inspectors detect illegally traded wildlife products, beginning with sharks. The DNA testing protocol, published last month, detects nine of 12 commonly traded shark species quickly enough to enable officials to determine whether a shipment requires further inspection. The researchers focused on [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[A multi-national research team has developed a rapid DNA identification method to help customs inspectors detect illegally traded wildlife products, beginning with sharks. The DNA testing protocol, published last month, detects nine of 12 commonly traded shark species quickly enough to enable officials to determine whether a shipment requires further inspection. A scalloped hammerhead shark (Sphyrna lewini) eyes a diver near Jarvis Island in the Pacific. These sharks have small mouths and sensing organs in their broad heads to find stingrays and other prey buried in the sand. They are considered endangered and are one of 12 shark species listed on CITES&#8217; Appendix II, which restricts trade in their meat, oil, and fins. The researchers focused on sharks because they are threatened by illegal killing and trafficking, but implementing trade laws on the ground has challenged customs officials. The 12 species are listed under Appendix II of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES), meaning trade in products from these species requires certification that specimens were caught legally and that trade does not harm the survival of the species. The 12 species, which include hammerhead, thresher, porbeagle, and great white sharks, are threatened in large part by the killing of massive numbers of them mainly for their fins, but also for meat and other products. For these and other species, limiting trade to levels lower than birth/survival rates enables populations to persist and is therefore a priority for shark conservation. The researchers, from Florida International University, Stony Brook University, and&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2018/12/dna-test-helps-officials-spot-dodgy-shark-shipments/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-213916</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Cities need forests too: A call for forests amid our concrete jungles (commentary)</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2018/03/cities-need-forests-too-a-call-for-forests-amid-our-concrete-jungles-commentary/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2018/03/cities-need-forests-too-a-call-for-forests-amid-our-concrete-jungles-commentary/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>21 Mar 2018 11:32:16 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Alistair Monument]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Mike Gaworecki]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2018/03/21110353/Hong-Kong-c-Alice-Zhuang-WWF-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=204977</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, East Asia, Global, and Hong Kong]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Air Pollution, Biodiversity, Cities, Climate Change, Commentary, Conservation, Environment, Forests, Global Warming, Health, Noise Pollution, Pollution, Public Health, Research, and Water]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Human beings evolved among trees. Even today, hundreds of millions of people live in and around forests, and depend upon them directly for their food, fuel, and livelihoods. Many of us, however, now live in concrete jungles instead. More than half the world’s population lives in cities, and that’s set to rise to two-thirds — [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Human beings evolved among trees. Even today, hundreds of millions of people live in and around forests, and depend upon them directly for their food, fuel, and livelihoods. Many of us, however, now live in concrete jungles instead. More than half the world’s population lives in cities, and that’s set to rise to two-thirds — more than 6 billion people — by 2050. Yet we still depend on forests more than we think. Take Hong Kong, where I live, for example. It’s the very picture of a modern metropolis, and one of the most densely populated regions on Earth. Step back from the skyscrapers and the bustling streets, though, and nearly a quarter of Hong Kong is forested. Hong Kong’s forests were once home to a vast range of species, including elephants and tigers. But over the centuries, large areas were cleared, and most of the remaining trees were felled for fuel during the Second World War. Over the last half-century, however, forests have been making a comeback through active replanting and natural regeneration. Protected parks cover around 40 per cent of Hong Kong’s territory today, and, while there are no plans to reintroduce tigers, these parks harbor incredible biodiversity: more than 2,100 native plants, 50 species of mammals, over 500 species of birds, and 230 different butterflies. For a city of more than 7 million inhabitants, having these wild places around is critical, not just for nature but also for people. A wealth of research has shown that cities&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2018/03/cities-need-forests-too-a-call-for-forests-amid-our-concrete-jungles-commentary/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-204977</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Illegal &#8216;white gold,&#8217; South Africa&#8217;s abalone, pouring into Hong Kong: TRAFFIC</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2018/02/illegal-white-gold-south-africas-abalone-pouring-into-hong-kong-traffic/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2018/02/illegal-white-gold-south-africas-abalone-pouring-into-hong-kong-traffic/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>13 Feb 2018 07:31:24 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Mongabay.com]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Shreya Dasgupta]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2018/02/13035132/5-Dried-South-African-abalone-on-sale-in-Hong-Kong-Markus-Burgener-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=203725</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Africa, Asia, China, Hong Kong, and South Africa]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Animals, Biodiversity, Conservation, Endangered Species, Marine, Marine Animals, Marine Conservation, Oceans, Overfishing, Wildlife, and Wildlife Trafficking]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Illegally sourced South African abalone (Haliotis midae), a marine snail considered a delicacy in East Asia, continues to flood Hong Kong markets, according to a new report by TRAFFIC, the wildlife trade monitoring network. Hong Kong imports abalone, dubbed “white gold” after its pearly flesh, in various forms: live, frozen, canned, and dried. Previous research [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Illegally sourced South African abalone (Haliotis midae), a marine snail considered a delicacy in East Asia, continues to flood Hong Kong markets, according to a new report by TRAFFIC, the wildlife trade monitoring network. Hong Kong imports abalone, dubbed “white gold” after its pearly flesh, in various forms: live, frozen, canned, and dried. Previous research has shown that much of the poached abalone is traded in dried form, partly because it can be easily packed and exported in large batches, and stored for long periods without refrigeration. Dried abalone is also easier to hide among other products as it reportedly smells less pungent than fresh or frozen abalone. In fact, past seizures of poached abalone in South Africa suggest that criminal syndicates prefer to smuggle dried abalone over other forms, according to the report. Dried abalone on sale in Hong Kong. Photo by Wilson Lau/TRAFFIC. By analyzing abalone trade data, TRAFFIC researchers have found that South African abalone imports into Hong Kong have progressively increased from 3,000 tonnes in 2000 to 6,170 tonnes in 2015. During this period, South Africa was the largest source of dried abalone to Hong Kong among other African countries. Much of these imports were illegal. In 2015, for instance, about 65 percent of South African dried abalone shipped to Hong Kong was poached. By contrast, 33 percent was produced through legal aquaculture farms, and 2 percent was legally caught from the wild. “Abalone is one of the most prized items in Cantonese cuisine — a must-have on&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2018/02/illegal-white-gold-south-africas-abalone-pouring-into-hong-kong-traffic/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-203725</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Hong Kong votes to ban ivory trade by 2021</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2018/02/hong-kong-votes-to-ban-ivory-trade-by-2021/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2018/02/hong-kong-votes-to-ban-ivory-trade-by-2021/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>01 Feb 2018 05:52:09 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Mongabay.com]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Shreya Dasgupta]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2016/03/01220724/south_africa_kruger_0526-495x330.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=203422</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Africa, Asia, China, and Hong Kong]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Animals, Biodiversity, Conservation, Crime, Endangered Species, Environment, Forests, Green, Happy-upbeat Environmental, Illegal Trade, International Trade, Ivory, Mammals, Wildlife, Wildlife Trade, and Wildlife Trafficking]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[In a historic move, 49 Hong Kong lawmakers voted on Jan. 31 to end all domestic ivory trade by 2021 and passed the Endangered Species of Animals and Plants (Amendment) Bill 2017, also called the Hong Kong Ivory Ban Bill. Only four legislators voted against the ban. The overwhelming vote comes just a month after China [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[In a historic move, 49 Hong Kong lawmakers voted on Jan. 31 to end all domestic ivory trade by 2021 and passed the Endangered Species of Animals and Plants (Amendment) Bill 2017, also called the Hong Kong Ivory Ban Bill. Only four legislators voted against the ban. The overwhelming vote comes just a month after China shut down all of its ivory markets and factories on the mainland. The new ivory ban bill also increases penalties for wildlife crimes. “Today’s decision is another milestone for the conservation of elephants, and should serve as further encouragement for governments in the region to put an end to the domestic ivory markets that fuel the poaching crisis,” James Compton, senior program director for wildlife trafficking watchdog TRAFFIC in Asia Pacific, said in a statement. “Hong Kong&#8217;s legislators should be congratulated for choosing to stand on the right side of history.” Ivory jewelry. Photo by USFWS Mountain-Prairie, licensed under CC BY 2.0/Flickr. Hong Kong, one of the world&#8217;s largest ivory markets, is a signatory to the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES). In 1989, CITES banned international trade in elephant ivory by placing elephants on Appendix I. The convention did not mandate the closure of domestic markets, though. So Hong Kong continued to allow ivory imported before 1976 (pre-convention or before CITES was established) or before 1990 (pre-ban ivory) to be legally traded. However, traders have been using loopholes within Hong Kong’s laws to re-stock their “legal” ivory&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2018/02/hong-kong-votes-to-ban-ivory-trade-by-2021/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-203422</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>The curious case of the phantom hippo teeth</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2017/12/facing-restrictions-on-elephant-ivory-traders-target-hippos-for-their-teeth/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2017/12/facing-restrictions-on-elephant-ivory-traders-target-hippos-for-their-teeth/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>04 Dec 2017 10:50:14 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Laura G. Shields]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Rhett Butler]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2017/12/03185144/hippo-photo-3-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=201793</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[China and Hong Kong]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Animals, Hippos, Ivory, Mammals, Wildlife, Wildlife consumption, Wildlife Trade, and Wildlife Trafficking]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Think of the illegal wildlife trade, and elephant tusks and rhino horns come to mind. But another of the world’s largest land mammals is slipping under the radar: the common hippopotamus (Hippopotamus amphibius) may be at greater risk than previously believed, according to a new analysis of the international trade in hippo teeth. Hippo ivory, [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Think of the illegal wildlife trade, and elephant tusks and rhino horns come to mind. But another of the world’s largest land mammals is slipping under the radar: the common hippopotamus (Hippopotamus amphibius) may be at greater risk than previously believed, according to a new analysis of the international trade in hippo teeth. Hippo ivory, from their large canines and incisors, is an affordable alternative to elephant ivory (international trade in elephant ivory is increasingly restricted). Its legal trade quotas are agreed upon by the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES). But when researchers looked into CITES trade records for an investigation recently published in the African Journal of Ecology, the numbers looked suspicious. Lead author Alexandra Andersson, a conservation biologist at the University of Hong Kong, examined the export and import numbers for animals in the legal trade markets, and noticed the numbers didn’t match up — sometimes dramatically so. Hippo teeth, primarily used for ornamental purposes, are available for sale in a Hong Kong shop. Credit: Alexandra Andersson / University of Hong Kong “I just thought that was a bit strange,” Andersson told Mongabay. “So I decided to select one case study to dive deeper into this issue and find out why this happens, and how it’s so prevalent in the CITES trade database.” She chose to investigate the hippo ivory trade, a straightforward case compared to other wildlife trades. Hong Kong imports more than 90 percent of global hippo teeth,&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2017/12/facing-restrictions-on-elephant-ivory-traders-target-hippos-for-their-teeth/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-201793</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>U.K. is the world’s biggest exporter of legal ivory, data analysis shows</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2017/08/u-k-is-the-worlds-biggest-exporter-of-legal-ivory-data-analysis-shows/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2017/08/u-k-is-the-worlds-biggest-exporter-of-legal-ivory-data-analysis-shows/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>10 Aug 2017 01:54:06 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[John Cannon]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[John Cannon]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2017/08/10014215/namibia_0969-768x423.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=198241</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Africa, Asia, China, Hong Kong, and United Kingdom]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Animals, Conservation, Elephants, Endangered Species, Environment, Hunting, Ivory, Mammals, Megafauna, Natural Resources, Poaching, Wildlife, Wildlife Trade, and Wildlife Trafficking]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[The United Kingdom ships more legal ivory beyond its borders than any other country, according to an analysis released today by the London-based NGO Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA). The announcement comes two days before World Elephant Day on Saturday. Globally, elephant numbers are falling, down 30 percent between 2007 and 2014 — a decline driven [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[The United Kingdom ships more legal ivory beyond its borders than any other country, according to an analysis released today by the London-based NGO Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA). The announcement comes two days before World Elephant Day on Saturday. Globally, elephant numbers are falling, down 30 percent between 2007 and 2014 — a decline driven largely by poaching to get ahold of elephants’ valuable tusks. The U.K. plays a “relatively minor” role in the trade of illegal ivory, said Shruti Suresh, a wildlife campaigner with EIA. But data from the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (Cites) show that, between 2010 and 2015, the U.K. exported more than three-and-a-half times the number of pieces of ivory exported by the U.S., the next largest supplier. Through 2013, the U.S. had been a much more prominent player. But regulations by the U.S.  government aimed at tackling the national and international trade of ivory slowed the flow to Hong Kong and China to a trickle, down to just 17 items in 2015. The U.K. filled that void, largely with what is referred to as antique ivory that was presumably taken from elephants killed years ago, before Cites began controlling international trade. The U.K. primarily exports antique ivory, such as this carved tusk from the 11th century. Photo in the public domain, via Wikimedia Commons “What was even more shocking was the destination of the ivory,” Suresh said in an interview. EIA found that, since 2014, the U.K.&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2017/08/u-k-is-the-worlds-biggest-exporter-of-legal-ivory-data-analysis-shows/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-198241</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Hong Kong officials seize &#8216;largest ever&#8217; ivory shipment worth $9 million</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2017/07/hong-kong-officials-seize-largest-ever-ivory-shipment-worth-9-million/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2017/07/hong-kong-officials-seize-largest-ever-ivory-shipment-worth-9-million/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>07 Jul 2017 06:50:13 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Shreya Dasgupta]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Shreya Dasgupta]]>
					</author>
															<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2017/07/07063123/Hong-Kong-ivory-bust-1-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=197116</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, China, Hong Kong, Malaysia, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Animals, Conservation, Crime, Elephants, Environment, Ivory, Mammals, Trade, Wildlife, Wildlife Trade, and Wildlife Trafficking]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[On July 4, Hong Kong customs officials seized about 7.2 metric tons of ivory tusks in what they estimate to be the world&#8217;s largest seizure of ivory tusks over the past 30 years. The ivory is estimated to be worth around HK$72 million (~$9.2 million). TRAFFIC, the wildlife trade monitoring network, added that the weight is [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[On July 4, Hong Kong customs officials seized about 7.2 metric tons of ivory tusks in what they estimate to be the world&#8217;s largest seizure of ivory tusks over the past 30 years. The ivory is estimated to be worth around HK$72 million (~$9.2 million). TRAFFIC, the wildlife trade monitoring network, added that the weight is yet to be verified, but once it is confirmed the haul could become the largest ever recorded seizure of ivory tusks, surpassing the 7.138 metric tons seized in Singapore in 2002. “This seizure is tragic and represents violent and cruel deaths for possibly hundreds of elephants, all for their ivory tusks and all for an industry that should be in its death throes in the Hong Kong SAR of China,” Grace Ge Gabriel, Regional Director China for the International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW), said in a statement. Hong Kong Customs seized &#8220;about&#8221; 7.2 tonnes of ivory tusks. Photo courtesy of Hong Kong customs authorities. The customs inspectors discovered the tusks inside a 40-feet Malaysian consignment declared as &#8220;frozen fish&#8221;. Following an initial investigation, the authorities have arrested the owner and two staff members of a trading company in Tuen Mun, Hong Kong. “Hong Kong Customs are to be warmly congratulated on this important seizure, but it is vital for a full and thorough investigation to take place in the aftermath to find out who was orchestrating this massive movement of contraband,” Yannick Kuehl, TRAFFIC’s Regional Director for East Asia, said in a statement. Under&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2017/07/hong-kong-officials-seize-largest-ever-ivory-shipment-worth-9-million/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-197116</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Vaquita survival hinges on stopping international swim bladder trade</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2017/06/vaquita-survival-hinges-on-stopping-international-swim-bladder-trade/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2017/06/vaquita-survival-hinges-on-stopping-international-swim-bladder-trade/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>08 Jun 2017 10:15:26 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Mongabay.com]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[John Cannon]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2017/06/08143807/vaquita-noaa.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=196440</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, China, Hong Kong, Mexico, Taiwan, and United States]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Animals, Biodiversity, Bycatch, Conservation, Defaunation, Dolphins, Ecosystems, Endangered Species, Environment, Extinction, Fish, Fishing, Global Environmental Crisis, Mammals, Marine, Marine Conservation, Marine Mammals, Megafauna, Natural Resources, Oceans, Overfishing, Vaquita, and Wildlife]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[New evidence lays out the intricate trade in animal body parts that conservation groups say are driving two marine species in Mexico’s Gulf of California closer to extinction. The battle to save them will have to be fought on fronts in several countries. The vaquita (Phocoena sinus), a tiny porpoise that averages just 43 kilograms [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Totoaba maws, or swim bladders, for sale in China. Photo courtesy of the Elephant Action League New evidence lays out the intricate trade in animal body parts that conservation groups say are driving two marine species in Mexico’s Gulf of California closer to extinction. The battle to save them will have to be fought on fronts in several countries. The vaquita (Phocoena sinus), a tiny porpoise that averages just 43 kilograms (95 pounds) and 1.5 meters (5 feet), is the world’s most endangered cetacean, a group that includes whales and dolphins. In large measure, that&#8217;s because they share their habitat with a fish called the totoaba (Totoaba macdonaldi) in a small slice of the Sea of Cortez between mainland Mexico and the Baja California peninsula. Gillnets intended for totoaba, as well as other fish, efficiently ensnare vaquita. Their numbers have plunged by 90 percent since 2011, according to a recent report by the conservation group WWF. Surging demand in China for the totoaba&#8217;s swim bladder, or “maw,” which helps the fish to float, is driving the harvest, sweeping up vaquita in the process, according to the report from WWF and a separate investigation by the watchdog group Elephant Action League. The totoaba itself is a Critically Endangered species according to the IUCN. To protect the vaquita, the organizations argue for a multinational effort to stop the flow of totoaba maws out of Mexico and through countries such as the U.S., as well as curbing the demand for them in southeastern&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2017/06/vaquita-survival-hinges-on-stopping-international-swim-bladder-trade/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-196440</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Hong Kong Ivory traders encouraging buyers to smuggle ivory: TRAFFIC</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2017/05/hong-kong-ivory-traders-encouraging-buyers-to-smuggle-ivory-traffic/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2017/05/hong-kong-ivory-traders-encouraging-buyers-to-smuggle-ivory-traffic/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>11 May 2017 04:32:18 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Shreya Dasgupta]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Shreya Dasgupta]]>
					</author>
															<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2017/05/11032441/hong-kong-ivory-report-820-768x400.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=195639</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, China, and Hong Kong]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Animals, Conservation, Crime, Elephants, Environment, Ivory, Mammals, Trade, Wildlife, Wildlife Trade, and Wildlife Trafficking]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Several licensed ivory dealers in Hong Kong are offering strategies for buyers to take ivory out of the city illegally, according to a new report by wildlife trade and monitoring group TRAFFIC. Members of TRAFFIC teams, posing as tourists, surveyed 131 legal ivory dealers in Hong Kong in August and December 2015. Most of these [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Several licensed ivory dealers in Hong Kong are offering strategies for buyers to take ivory out of the city illegally, according to a new report by wildlife trade and monitoring group TRAFFIC. Members of TRAFFIC teams, posing as tourists, surveyed 131 legal ivory dealers in Hong Kong in August and December 2015. Most of these shops &#8212; which included antique galleries, gift and souvenir shops, and jewellery and specialty stores &#8212; are concentrated in areas that tend to attract tourists and antique buyers. Ivory jewelry. Photo by USFWS Mountain-Prairie, licensed under CC BY 2.0/Flickr. The team found that of the 74 (or 56 percent) licensed shops selling ivory, only 23 shops (or 31 percent) had their licenses displayed during the surveys. This is in violation of Hong Kong regulations, according to which all licensed ivory dealers must display their license in a conspicuous position on their premises. Moreover, when the team asked the shopkeepers if the ivory on display could be taken to mainland China, more than one-third of the traders (27 of the 74 traders) encouraged the buyers to smuggle ivory out of Hong Kong without obtaining the necessary permits. Exporting ivory bought in Hong Kong to mainland China would involve crossing an international border, which is illegal and in violation of CITES regulations. (CITES is short for Convention on international trade in endangered species of wild fauna and flora, under which, international trade in elephant ivory is banned.) Some shopkeepers told the teams, for example, that small ivory&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2017/05/hong-kong-ivory-traders-encouraging-buyers-to-smuggle-ivory-traffic/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-195639</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Bright lights, big city, tiny frog: Romer’s tree frog survives Hong Kong</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2017/02/bright-lights-big-city-tiny-frog-romers-tree-frog-survives-hong-kong/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2017/02/bright-lights-big-city-tiny-frog-romers-tree-frog-survives-hong-kong/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>03 Feb 2017 11:32:14 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Asher Elbein]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Glenn Scherer]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2017/02/03112227/7-P.-romeri-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=192949</guid>

											<reporting-project>
							<![CDATA[Almost Famous Animals]]>
						</reporting-project>
					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Hong Kong, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Amphibians, Animals, Biodiversity, Captive Breeding, Cities, Conservation, Deforestation, Ecology, Ecosystems, Endangered Species, Environment, Extinction, Frogs, Global Environmental Crisis, Habitat, Habitat Degradation, Habitat Loss, Happy-upbeat Environmental, Herps, Human-wildlife Conflict, Infrastructure, Mass Extinction, Rainforests, Restoration, Tropical Deforestation, and Wildlife]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Romer&#8217;s tree frog is, in every respect, an animal that keeps out of the way. Start with its size: averaging just 1.5 to 2.5 centimeters (0.6 to 1 inches) in length, the tiny brown frog isn&#8217;t just the smallest frog living inside the territory of Hong Kong, but among the smallest in the world. Despite [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[A Romer&#8217;s tree frog calls in the leaf litter. Photo courtesy of Kadoorie Farm and Botanic Garden Romer&#8217;s tree frog is, in every respect, an animal that keeps out of the way. Start with its size: averaging just 1.5 to 2.5 centimeters (0.6 to 1 inches) in length, the tiny brown frog isn&#8217;t just the smallest frog living inside the territory of Hong Kong, but among the smallest in the world. Despite its name (and suction-cup toes), it climbs rarely and reluctantly, preferring instead to hide in the leaf-litter of the island forests, aided by a cryptic color pattern of brown skin and faint black “X” markings on its back. There it spends its short life hunting termites and crickets, and being hunted in turn by centipedes and wolf spiders. The tree frog emerges from cover only to court and lay its eggs in shallow, out of the way pools and ditches, where fish can’t reach them. It is, in short, not the sort of animal that you would expect to make a fuss. But the Romer’s tree frog inhabits the fringes of an urban wilderness, at the mouth of a river that has been part of the biggest spike in human population in history. As such, it keeps hopping into and out of the ecological limelight: Since its discovery in the 1950s, the species has been declared extinct, rediscovered, immediately declared Critically Endangered, then seriously threatened by development, and eventually became the focus of one of the first ever,&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2017/02/bright-lights-big-city-tiny-frog-romers-tree-frog-survives-hong-kong/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-192949</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Exotic populations hold hope for internationally traded endangered species</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2017/01/exotic-populations-hold-hope-for-illegally-traded-endangered-species/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2017/01/exotic-populations-hold-hope-for-illegally-traded-endangered-species/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>04 Jan 2017 06:29:42 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Shreya Dasgupta]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Shreya Dasgupta]]>
					</author>
															<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2017/01/04053912/Peter-and-Michelle-Wong-701x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=192131</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Australia, Global, Hong Kong, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Amphibians, Animals, Biodiversity, Birds, Conservation, Environment, Hunting, Mammals, Pet Trade, Pets, Poaching, Reintroductions, Wildlife, Wildlife Trade, and Wildlife Trafficking]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Many internationally traded species are on the verge of extinction in their native countries. In some cases, traded animals have managed to escape &#8212; or have been deliberately introduced &#8212; into new locations, forming feral populations. These secondary, often thriving, populations could hold hope for the survival of endangered species in their native ranges, suggests [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Many internationally traded species are on the verge of extinction in their native countries. In some cases, traded animals have managed to escape &#8212; or have been deliberately introduced &#8212; into new locations, forming feral populations. These secondary, often thriving, populations could hold hope for the survival of endangered species in their native ranges, suggests a new study published in the journal Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment. For example, the demand for cage birds has caused severe population declines of the Critically Endangered yellow-crested cockatoo (Cacatua sulphurea) in its native range in eastern Indonesia and East Timor. But the bird thrives in Hong Kong, thanks to some pet cockatoos that escaped and established a population there. “Personally, the biggest surprise to me was that the raucous, sparkling-white birds I regularly see flying outside my office window in Hong Kong are critically endangered,” lead author Luke Gibson of the University of Hong Kong told Mongabay. “How could such a conspicuous species thriving amidst the skyscrapers in downtown Hong Kong be threatened?” The Critically Endangered yellow-crested cockatoo thrives in Hong Kong, thanks to some pet cockatoos that escaped and established a population there. Photo by Timothy Bonebrake. Gibson and his colleague Ding Li Yong decided to investigate this further, and discovered that the yellow-crested cockatoo is not an isolated example. They identified 49 globally threatened species that have established wild populations outside their native distributions on all continents except Antarctica. Sometimes, the exotic populations have fared better than their native counterparts. For instance,&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2017/01/exotic-populations-hold-hope-for-illegally-traded-endangered-species/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-192131</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Top 10 HAPPY environmental stories of 2016</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2016/12/top-10-happy-environmental-stories-of-2016/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2016/12/top-10-happy-environmental-stories-of-2016/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>28 Dec 2016 07:50:28 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Shreya Dasgupta]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Shreya Dasgupta]]>
					</author>
															<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2016/12/28071559/kenya_2718-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=191928</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Africa, Antarctica, Arctic, Arctic Ocean, Asia, Atlantic Ocean, Borneo, Canada, China, Colombia, Democratic Republic Of Congo, Global, Guatemala, Hong Kong, India, Indonesia, Malaysia, Myanmar, North America, South America, South Asia, Southeast Asia, and United States]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Animals, Biodiversity, Conservation, Critically Endangered Species, Endangered Species, Environment, Forests, Happy-upbeat Environmental, Illegal Trade, International Trade, Ivory, Marine, Marine Animals, Marine Conservation, Marine Protected Areas, Oceans, Pet Trade, Rainforests, Trees, Wildlife, Wildlife Trade, and Wildlife Trafficking]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[As always, Mongabay covered a mix of environmental stories this year. While some species went extinct, several new species were discovered. Some forests were wiped out, but others were restored. Below, we take a look at some of the “happier” stories of 2016 (in no particular order) — from the declaration of large marine parks to animals that are recovering after [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[As always, Mongabay covered a mix of environmental stories this year. While some species went extinct, several new species were discovered. Some forests were wiped out, but others were restored. Below, we take a look at some of the “happier” stories of 2016 (in no particular order) — from the declaration of large marine parks to animals that are recovering after years of decline, a reserve for the world’s largest primate, and increased restrictions on wildlife trade. 1. Animals are bouncing back from the brink of extinction For some animals, 2016 was a good year. Take California’s Island foxes for example. In august, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service announced a proposal to remove three subspecies of the island fox — found on San Miguel, Santa Rosa and Santa Cruz Islands &#8212; from the Federal List of Threatened and Endangered Wildlife. According to the U.S. FWS, this was the fastest mammal recovery in Endangered Species Act history, thanks to an aggressive recovery plan. Another species in California, the Sierra Nevada yellow-legged frog, showed rapid signs of recovery. Once close to extinction, frog numbers seem to have increased seven-fold over the last 20 years, a recent study found. Effective conservation efforts also resulted in improved conservation status of species like the Giant Panda, Tibetan Antelope, the Bridled Nailtail Wallaby, and the Greater Stick-nest rat this year. The Giant Panda, for example, was down-listed from Endangered to Vulnerable in the IUCN Red List, while the Tibetan Antelope was moved from Endangered to Near Threatened. Saiga antelopes in Kazakhstan,&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2016/12/top-10-happy-environmental-stories-of-2016/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-191928</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Hong Kong to ban ivory trade by 2021</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2016/12/hong-kong-to-ban-ivory-trade-by-2021/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2016/12/hong-kong-to-ban-ivory-trade-by-2021/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>22 Dec 2016 09:35:46 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Shreya Dasgupta]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Shreya Dasgupta]]>
					</author>
															<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2016/06/01200654/African-elephant-495x330.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=191878</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, China, and Hong Kong]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Animals, Conservation, Crime, Elephants, Environment, Illegal Trade, Ivory, Poaching, Trade, Wildlife, Wildlife Trade, and Wildlife Trafficking]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[On Wednesday, Hong Kong government announced that its three-step plan to phase out domestic ivory trade by the end of 2021 was approved by the Chief Executive in Council. The legislature amendments will be tabled before the Legislative Council during the first half of 2017. “Hong Kong is determined to stem the illegal ivory trade,” Secretary for [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[On Wednesday, Hong Kong government announced that its three-step plan to phase out domestic ivory trade by the end of 2021 was approved by the Chief Executive in Council. The legislature amendments will be tabled before the Legislative Council during the first half of 2017. “Hong Kong is determined to stem the illegal ivory trade,” Secretary for the Environment KS Wong said. “The measures will send a very strong signal to the international community on Hong Kong&#8217;s determination to curb illicit trade in ivory.” &nbsp; &nbsp; The Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) banned international trade in elephant ivory in 1989 by placing elephants on Appendix I. But it did not require closure of domestic markets. Following the ban, Hong Kong issued possession licenses to traders, allowing ivory obtained before 1976 (before CITES provisions became applicable to elephants) to be freely traded, and ivory imported before 1990 (pre-ban ivory) to be traded within Hong Kong. Advocacy groups such as WildAid have, however, shown that traders often use loopholes within Hong Kong’s laws to re-stock their “legal” ivory stockpiles with illegal ivory from recently poached elephants. The government’s three-step plan aims to completely phase out domestic ivory trade in the next five years. Step one of the plan will see an immediate ban on the import and re-export of all elephant hunting trophies and ivory products acquired after 1976 when provisions of the CITES became applicable to elephants. Step two will ban the import and re-export&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2016/12/hong-kong-to-ban-ivory-trade-by-2021/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-191878</doi>				</item>
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