Wildlife trade offences are now considered serious offences under the Organised Crime Act August 30, 2024

Indian pangolin or anteater (PHOTO: Getty Images)

By AFP - Agence France Presse

Wildlife trade offences are now considered serious offences under the Organised Crime Act

Singapore - Wildlife trafficking is now a ‘serious offense’ under Singapore's Organised Crime Act, the city-state's Home Affairs Ministry said, and those prosecuted under the code will be subject to sentences of up to 20 years in prison.

Singapore is a favored transshipment route for traffickers, conservationists say, with Southeast Asia at the center of much of the multi-billion dollar illicit industry.

‘The Ministry of Home Affairs will include wildlife trade offenses as serious offenses in the schedule to the Organised Crime Act 2015, with effect from 30 August 2024,’ the MHA said in a statement on Thursday.

If you are found to have links with criminal groups, offenders could face up to 20 years in prison under the Organised Crime Act, the ministry added.

The offenses include the import and export of endangered species and their transit without a permit issued under the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES).

The inclusion also empowers the authorities to seize ill-gotten gains from wildlife traders with links to organized crime.

Wildlife traffickers with no links to organized crime are not covered by the law and can only face up to six years in prison.

The organized crime law covers offenses considered serious threats to public security and those associated with criminal groups, such as drug trafficking and unlicensed money lending.

‘International wildlife trafficking operates through a sophisticated cross-border supply chain,’ said the MHA.

The action was a ‘proactive measure’ to deter the operations of ‘organized crime groups should such activities arise in Singapore in the future’, it added.

The black market in illegal wildlife products is worth up to US$20 billion a year, according to Interpol.

Southeast Asia is at the epicenter of much of the illicit trade, with Singapore seen as a convenient transshipment route by organized crime groups because it is a regional trading hub, environmental group WWF-Singapore said on its website.

In October 2022, Singapore authorities made their biggest-ever seizure of rhino horn, confiscating a US$830,000 cargo from a smuggler arriving from South Africa and intending to travel to Laos.

In July 2019, Singapore made its biggest-ever seizure of smuggled ivory, confiscating almost nine tonnes of tusks smuggled from around 300 elephants.

The illegal cargo from the Democratic Republic of Congo was destined for Vietnam.

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