Five Ways China’s Wildlife Protection Law Will Harm Wildlife
The Chinese government released a new draft of its wildlife conservation law, and it does shockingly little to actually promote conservation.
While China’s President Xi Jinping has been speaking out about the country’s commitment to combating wildlife trade, bureaucrats at the State Forestry Administration seem to be doing the opposite.
They’re responsible for occasional, routine updates to China’s outdated Wildlife Protection Law. While the current version of the law, in force since 1989, states that its purpose is to protect and save threatened wildlife, the draft new version adds the competing goal of “regulating the utilization of wildlife.” The language in many ways undermines the president’s—and many citizens’—desire to end the exploitation of wildlife in China.
First, the draft law continues to allow the existence of captive breeding programs of wild animals for commercial purposes, as well as the capture of wild animals
