News

                                 Lions do not fare well in terms of publicity and awareness

Not many people realize there are fewer lions remaining on the planet than rhinos, elephants, orang-utans, chimpanzees, blue whales or polar bears and comparatively speaking fewer even than tigers. We say this because whilst there are only around 3,200 tigers left now, they are solitary animals whereas lions, whose remaining numbers are around 15,000, are the only social cat and need to live in prides of around 10 animals to thrive. So, in terms of lion “units, we are down to the last 1,500 and only 5 viable populations left on the African continent.

We absolutely applaud the initiatives leading to the illegal wildlife trade conference on 21st May at St James’s Palace and we thank our Royal Family for highlighting the catastrophic growth of the illegal wildlife trade. But we were dismayed to see that yet again, the lion was not discussed despite the fact that the escalating lion bone trade (to replace tiger bones in Asian Traditional Medicine) is fuelling unprecedented levels of poaching of lions across the African continent. In addition, it is well documented that lion cubs are being smuggled to South Africa to feed their breeding programmes for the “canned” hunting trade and to the Arab Emirates to feed the pet trade. 

This follows a similar story at the recent CITES conference held in Bangkok this year. Lions were not even on the agenda. Lions are the ONLY big cat species not on CITES Appendix 1. A crazy situation that is being allowed as lions are the number one species desired by trophy hunters and the power, money and influence of trophy hunting lobbies are very strong.

Something needs to be done and quickly.

• We are calling for accurate lion counts in the few remaining African lion range states, to replace the current data based on questionnaires, guesstimates and extrapolations from habitat data. 
• We are calling for accurate lion counts to be conducted in hunting concessions by independent assessors. 
• We are calling for other African lion range states to join Botswana, Kenya and Zambia to put a halt to all lion trophy hunting. 
• We are calling on the importing countries to ban lion trophies as the offtake levels are unsustainable. 
• We call on all importing countries to ban lion trophies from “canned” hunting sources as it is an industry based on cruelty and a lack of morals and ethics. 
• We call on UNESCO and UNEP to pass resolutions to declare lions a World Heritage Species and to ensure maximum levels of protection for the species. 
• We call on the world public to take action to prevent further trade in lion products and to spread awareness about the ever-declining numbers in Africa. 
• We call on all members of the public, grant-making agencies, governments, corporations, and international bodies to significantly increase funding for effective lion conservation programmes that reduce human/lion conflict, resurrect national protected areas and stabilize remaining lion populations.  

Further trade, prevarication, complacency and dawdling is out of the question for a species so crucially important not only for our culture and heritage but also for the health and biodiversity of Africa’s ecosystems.

Picture credit: Chris Harvey  

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