Trophy hunting: why a UK import ban threatens wildlife conservation
Trophy hunting, where animals with characteristics such as large antlers are legally hunted, and their meat usually eaten - is highly contested. While some argue it is unethical and delivers few benefits, others say it provides an important incentive for conserving threatened species and habitats by helping generate revenue for governments and local communities.
Restrictions on trophy hunting imports have been imposed in the US, Europe and Australia, while the UK recently announced that it would “ban imports from thousands of species … as part of a wider UK drive on international conservation”. As a professor of wildlife conservation with over 25 years’ field experience, I strongly believe that trophy hunting import bans are driven more by misinformation than the weight of scientific evidence, and risk increasing threats to wildlife and undermining local rights and livelihoods.
My colleague Hans Bauer recently argued the opposite case in The Conversation, supporting an import ban based on what he considers trophy hunting’s disappointing contributions to conservation and local development. Here’s why I’m not convinced.
A complex situation
Bauer cites alarming lion population collapses in West Africa to support trophy import bans. But for effective policy, we must understand the reasons behind these trends. The cited steep declines among lion populations in West African countries with trophy hunting could be taken to imply that trophy hunting was an important factor, but the 2011 paper referenced in the previous article attributed wildlife declines to poaching, habitat loss and disease. It never mentioned trophy hunting as a threat, but did say that it can help fund anti-poaching and wider management, as well as providing community benefits.
Bauer also uses another West African conservation area, the W-Arly-Pendjari (WAP) complex as another example of how he thinks trophy hunting has failed lions. But a 2016 study found that “the lion population was not significantly affected by hunting” in the region. The authors of this study also said: “An import embargo on lion trophies from the WAP would not be justified. It could ruin the incentive of local actors to conserve lions in hunting areas, and lead to a drastic reduction of lion range in West Africa.”
Even if the West African case example was clear-cut, which it is not, insights from one region are often not representative of elsewhere. With the proposed UK import ban purported to affect nearly 7,000 species (a baffling figure as there aren’t 7,000 species trophy hunted worldwide), it is crucial to consider the bigger picture. Campaigns to ban trophy hunting often raise the risk of extinction. But it seems no one can cite a single species for which trophy hunting is a major conservation threat. Far greater threats to lions include loss of habitat and prey, and conflict with people.
