Meet wildlife crime expert John Scanlon: long read interview

(c) Dr Sanjay Kumar Shukla

Born Free is honoured to work alongside John Scanlon and the impactful #EndWildlifeCrime initiative. From pangolins killed for scales to wild-caught cheetah cubs traded as pets, to sharks illegally killed for their fins, wildlife crime is a critical threat to wild animals and wild places worldwide.  
 
There is urgent need for global action and cast-iron legislation. A remarkable warrior for wildlife, John Scanlon has dedicated his life to protecting the natural world and fighting crime.  

John Scanlon

John Scanlon AO is an Australian lawyer who established one of the country’s first law practices specialising in environmental law. From 2010-2018, John served as Secretary-General of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) – which regulates global trade in certain wild animals and plants. He was founding Chair of the International Consortium on Combating Wildlife Crime (ICCWC) in 2010.

John then joined African Parks as its first Special Envoy from 2018-2020. John is now the CEO of the Elephant Protection Initiative Foundation, Chair of the Global Initiative to End Wildlife Crime, and Chair of the UK Governments’ Illegal Wildlife Trade Challenge Fund and a Trustee with the Royal Botanical Gardens, Kew. He lives with his family near Geneva, Switzerland.

John, you have a background in Law. What led you to work on wildlife issues?

I’m a first generation Australian. I grew up in Adelaide, Australia and spent a lot of time in the Bush with my parents as I was growing up. My mother was from rural Sweden, and I had the opportunity as a young kid to get into the wonderful forest they have north of Stockholm. I think that was the start of my great passion for wildlife.

I ended up doing law and, during my studies, one of the options was a new course called environment planning law and I thought, well, that’s interesting. I realised for the first time that I could combine my interest in wildlife and nature, the environment, with a career in the law. I ended up going into legal practice and set up one of Australia’s first environmental law practices.

How big an issue is wildlife crime, and what impacts does it have on animals, people and the wider environment?

I think we can look at it quite broadly and look at the massive impacts on wildlife. Wildlife is facing multiple threats, one of which is over exploitation, including through wildlife trafficking, and it’s a massive issue. It’s happening in an industrial scale. The impacts are huge.

The impacts have been estimated by the World Bank to be in the order of $1–2 trillion a year (this includes the negative impacts illegal trade has on ecosystem functioning, not least to mitigate climate change). And we’re seeing it lead to species extinction and degradation of ecosystems, as well as everything that goes with that, such as impact on indigenous peoples, local communities, on their livelihoods, on their security.

So yes, this is a massive issue, and it extends well beyond the impact on the plant or animal itself. It has a significant impact on ecosystems, economies, livelihoods, as well as public and animal health.

Why did you set up the Global Initiative to End Wildlife Crime and how did Born Free help?

Well, as you know, I spent eight years as Secretary General of CITES. During the course of my tenure, I placed a lot of emphasis and put a lot of energy into raising awareness of wildlife trafficking, and scaling up the global response to both preventing and combating wildlife crime.

We had a degree of success. However, I learned through those eight years that while CITES is a remarkable instrument, it was never designed to prevent and combat wildlife trafficking. It’s a trade-related, not a crime-related convention.

In conversation with various colleagues, including (Born Free Co-Founder) Will Travers and yourself, I thought it was time to publicly express myself in terms of the need to look beyond CITES to a new legal instrument, if we wanted to really have an impact in preventing and combating wildlife trafficking.

A small group of us, including Born Free, decided we should put together an initiative. Born Free was generous enough to work with UK parliamentarians and enable us to do a soft launch of the Global Initiative to End Wildlife Crime on 3rd March 2020, at the House of Lords with you, Mark, moderating the event (with the formal launch on 5 June 2020).

So, Born Free has been involved from the outset on developing the shape and scope of the global initiative, and has been a very active member of the steering group. Born Free has allowed us to use your ECOSOC (United Nations Economic and Social Council) status at various meetings to attend and participate. So Born Free has been an integral part of this from the start. Right through its five-year history.

But how does improving legislation help stop criminals?

I look at it in three ways. You have to have a legislative base, you have to have access to technology, and you have to have access to financing. Now that’s in the context that you need to work at all levels, including on the ground.

These are three elements you need, but fundamentally you have to have a legislative basis to intervene. And you need that at an international level, and at a national level and sometimes a sub-national level.

At the moment is there is no global agreement on preventing and combating wildlife trafficking. We’ve reverted to CITES in the absence of any other instrument, but it’s the wrong instrument. It’s not designed to do it. It only covers less than 1% of the world’s species, and doesn’t address domestic trade and other issues.

CITES doesn’t address the issue of illegal harvesting, so there’s a lot of gaps. At an international level we need to set out how we define wildlife crime. What conduct should be criminalised, how states agree to cooperate to prevent and combat crime, how they agree to share information on known criminal groups on forensics, how they agree to deal with demand, et cetera.

So we need that international framework and we need enforcement at national level. You need strong and robust national legislation to advise citizens of what conduct is regarded as illegal and to put in place the procedures for addressing illegal behaviour.

If you don’t have legislation as a foundation, you have no basis upon which to actually use the law to intervene.

What progress has the initiative made, and what still needs to happen if we are to tackle wildlife crime?

After the ‘soft launch’ of the Global Initiative on 3rd March 2020, then a more formal launch on 5th June the same year, we waited to see whether we were going to get any traction. Our idea was to see how things evolved and how our proposition was received, in particular in relation to strengthening the international legal framework.

From modest beginnings, our small steering group has grown exponentially. We now have 45 organisations from across every region and every sector who are part of this global initiative. That includes over 40 organisations that are what we call ‘international champions’. Among them are the World Travel and Tourism Council, the World Oceans Council, International Rangers Federation, entities dealing with wood products, as well as the Wildlife Justice Commission and the Wildlife Conservation Society.

We’ve had much more success and gained much more momentum than we ever could have imagined. When we kicked this off five years ago, we recognised this isn’t going to work unless we work very effectively especially with states. Because states make international law, not initiatives, not NGOs (non governmental organisations).

I think we’ve worked in a very considered and respectful manner with states to encourage them down this path. By doing this, we’ve secured the first ever resolution adopted by the UN Crime Commission, which introduces the idea of a new protocol under the UN Convention against Transnational Organised Crime.

So we’ve gone from really humble beginnings to have collected a huge number of supportive organisations, as well as key individuals who are our technical advisors. And we’ve managed to work very effectively with states and support them in putting forward historic and ground-breaking resolutions that have been adopted through the UN.

And that is ongoing because now we’ve got a process that has been launched at the UN Convention against Transnational Organised Crime. An Intergovernmental Expert Group has been created that’s going to do a deep dive into whether and how we can strengthen the international legal framework, including through a potential protocol or protocols under that convention. This extraordinary progress reflects a great sense of collegiality (teamwork) amongst the steering group and our wider ‘Group of Champions’.

Lastly, what can Born Free’s supporters do to help?

Making international law depends upon the view of states or countries, and countries are obviously influenced by what their citizens feel. And it’s very important that politicians are aware that these issues of wildlife trafficking and strengthening the international legal framework are of interest to their citizens.

So, what’s important is to make yourself heard, to express yourself. Write to your local politician, let them know Born Free has a number of events and activities they can engage with.

Participate. Show your support. Get involved in whatever way you can. Everyone can express themselves and influence people around them. It’s extraordinarily valuable for people to influence their politicians. So that’s what I’d encourage you to do.

And of course, it’s also very much appreciated if you’re able to make a modest donation towards Born Free. Born Free also needs to sustain itself to be able to continue its good work!