Sustainability assessments should precede interventions promoting the hunting and consumptive use of pangolins

Challender et al. (2024) argue that a recent amendment to a CITES (Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora) resolution could be detrimental to pangolins via reducing sustainable use options, particularly for Indigenous Peoples (IPs) and Local Communities (LCs) in Central and West Africa. The resolution in question, Res. Conf. 17.10 (Rev. CoP19), was initially adopted in 2016 when all eight pangolin species were included in Appendix I of CITES, prohibiting international commercial trade of wild-caught pangolins. The latest amendment, adopted in 2022 by the CITES Conference of the Parties, is consistent with the long-standing CITES precedent of calling for the closure of domestic markets in certain endangered CITES Appendix I species (or taxa)—examples include elephants, Asian big cats, helmeted hornbill, and marine turtles (CITES, 2016, 2022a, 2022b, 2022c). It urges “Parties in whose jurisdiction there is a legal domestic market for specimens of pangolins that is contributing to poaching or illegal trade, [to] take all necessary legislative, regulatory and enforcement measures to close their domestic markets for commercial trade in pangolin specimens and report such closures to the Secretariat” (CITES, 2022d, p. 2).

IPs and LCs have been historically excluded from conservation decision-making and actions in numerous countries (Brittain et al., 2021). In the context of Res. Conf. 17.10 (Rev. CoP19), Challender et al. propose that legal provisions for IPs and LCs to use pangolins sustainably could enhance pangolin conservation. The authors focus on Central and West Africa, suggesting domestic legislation excludes IPs and LCs in tropical Africa from using pangolins. However, this is not the case in Gabon (and possibly elsewhere in Africa), where traditional customary law permits pangolin hunting outside protected areas (Mambeya et al., 2018).

We agree with Challender et al. that policies aiming to reduce threats to pangolins should consider the views and needs of IPs and LCs. Nonetheless, given that all pangolin species are globally threatened, we caution that any such use must be based on robust sustainability assessments and a clear understanding of what constitutes sustainable use—both of which are currently lacking for pangolins (we expand on this point below). Furthermore, such programs should also be grounded in site-specific assessments, as pangolin population dynamics and the socio-economic characteristics of communities around pangolin habitat conceivably vary across pangolin range. Additionally, given that the hunting and commercialization of pangolins are prohibited by law in virtually all Central and West African countries (USAID/West Africa Biodiversity and Climate Change, 2020), and all international trade for primarily commercial purposes is prohibited by CITES, conservation programs promoting the consumptive use of pangolins in these regions would need to ensure legal compliance, which is crucial for their long term success.

The Convention on Biological Diversity defines sustainable use as “the use of components of biological diversity in a way and at a rate that does not lead to the long-term decline of biological diversity, thereby maintaining its potential to meet the needs and aspirations of present and future generations” (CBD, 2011, p. 5). In line with this, interventions promoting sustainable use of pangolins, which Challender et al. appear to advocate, require information on at least their population size and dynamics and hunting rates. However, population estimates are largely lacking for all pangolin species (Chong et al., 2020; Gudehus et al., 2020; Hoffmann et al., 2020; Jansen et al., 2020; Mahmood et al., 2020; Pietersen et al., 2020; Schoppe et al., 2020; Wu et al., 2020) and there is also a critical knowledge gap regarding the impacts of local consumptive use of pangolins on the long-term sustainability of the species (Heighton & Gaubert, 2021; Pietersen & Challender, 2020).

While we recognize the challenges in estimating pangolin population sizes and monitoring their ecology (Willcox et al., 2019), without population and reproduction data, one cannot determine the impacts of any consumptive use program on the survival of African pangolins—whose exploitation is already alarming (Emogor et al., 2021; Ingram et al., 2018). There is therefore an urgent need for more ecological studies and the development of new computational methods to gather robust data and/or infer population dynamics from existing data, respectively. Where legally permitted, this information could potentially support pilot sustainable use programs in line with the precautionary principle, while additional robust ecological and socioeconomic data are collected to refine assessments for adaptive management.

In closing, we therefore propose that (a) conservation interventions promoting the hunting and use of pangolins – and indeed any endangered species – must first provide sound, science-based site-specific assessments of the impacts of such use on their wild populations and (b) such interventions should also be in line with national legislation and international law and have robust compliance and enforcement strategies to ensure that offtakes do not exceed science-based, allowable limits.

All authors contributed to writing the article.

C.A.E. and K.P. are members of the IUCN SSC Pangolin Specialist Group, but the views expressed in this paper do not represent those of the group. C.A.E. was supported by Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA) to attend the 19th CITES Conference of the Parties (CoP19). EIA supported the adoption of Resolution Conf. 17.10 (Rev. CoP19) at CoP19. C.A.E. is a non-stipendiary conservation fellow at Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) and S.L. is an employee of WCS, which supported the adoption of Resolution Conf. 17.10 (Rev. CoP19).