Rich look to Indonesia for exotic pets

Rich look to Indonesia for exotic pets

Eric Unmacht, Deutsche Presse-Agentur/Jakarta

Among the honking cabs and towering skyscrapers of New York City is likely the last place someone would look to find a Komodo Dragon, the giant lizard that devours live goats, deer and wild boars in its native island home in Indonesia.

But experts on Indonesia's illegal wildlife trade point to the confiscation of one of the rare reptiles in New York as one of many examples showing the reach of the country's illegal trade, which continues to feed much of the world's desire for exotic pets.

Other stories include elephants found in backyard gardens, crocodiles confiscated from private ponds, gibbons and tigers seized from government residences, birds snatched from military warships and orangutans rescued from prostitution dens.

And those are just the larger animals.

"People will buy anything," said Dr. Willie Smits, chairman of the Borneo Orangutan Survival Foundation. "I mean Komodo Dragons are big, smelly, nasty things. Who would want one of those for their home? It's just a status thing."

Reliable figures on the illegal buying and selling of Indonesia's protected animals for pets are difficult to come by, but rescues by authorities and wildlife organizations suggest the trade is still flourishing despite laws designed to fight it.

Indonesia, with its diverse array of species on remote islands and often corruption-prone law enforcement and porous sea borders, is a prime supplier of some of the world's most-wanted pet species, whether for individual use, private exhibits or commercial zoos.

"Almost all of these 'zoos' are involved in the animal trade," Smits said.

The problem of rare species being illegally shipped out of the country to commercial establishments was highlighted by the recent controversy over some 100 orangutans held at a privately owned Thai zoo in Bangkok, Safari World, that were used for display and boxing matches.

Weeks of allegations that the orangutans had been illegally smuggled from Indonesia were followed by police DNA tests on the animals. Safari World finally admitted this week to having acquired at least 45 of the primates illegally.

The issue will likely be a bone of contention between Indonesian and Thai representatives at the ongoing Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) conference in Bangkok, and will keep fueling the wider debate on private zoos.

"It illustrates a far broader problem with the changing trade dynamics in this part of the world," said James Compton, Southeast Asia director of Traffic, a wildlife trade monitoring network.

Tigers and orangutans have been traded to zoos and private wildlife parks on the slim justification that these were primarily for noncommercial purposes," Compton said.

"This is a gray area within the CITES," he said. "It's one that is exploited by the exporting and importing nations. It's not really on the radar screen. Are zoos commercial enterprises? Well, yes, in many cases you can say they are."

It's not just private zoos and collectors abroad that are fueling the trade in Indonesia's protected species. In big cities like the capital Jakarta, owning rare species is a sign of social status and prestige among some members of the wealthy and powerful elite.

Officials and conservationists say Indonesia's business and political elite, its powerful government officials and security forces, and even art collectors, often keep collections of rare and protected animals in their homes.

They say one of the hot trends among animal collectors right now is rare birds, especially birds from remote areas such as the Birds of Paradise from the easternmost island of Papua.

Wildlife experts say some 350,000 birds are now sold in Jakarta each year, replacing the once-popular mounted bird mantle piece.

"People don't want mounted birds anymore, but live ones," said Chairul Saleh, head of policy and trade at the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) in Indonesia. "They have more prestige."

Authorities perform raids on homes and markets, often in conjunction with non-governmental organizations (NGOs), and sometimes on high-profile residences, but efforts to crack down are often hampered by authorities' involvement in the highly- lucrative trade.

"Our problem is enforcement. There's always a problem with enforcement," said Dr. Samedi, from the Ministry of Forestry's Directorate General of Forest Protection and Nature Conservation.

"Even if our raids are planned in a very short time, the traders still know," he said.