Twice as many plants and animals sold in wildlife trade as previously thought, says report

More than 100,000 species are traded globally, whether illegally smuggled, sold as ornaments or in fisheries, timber and fashion industries, study finds

The number of plant and animal species in use or sold in the wildlife trade is more than twice as high as previously thought, researchers have discovered.

A study, published in Science Advances, warns that there are huge gaps in global assessments of how wildlife is traded, and that past estimates have failed to keep up with changes such as the boom in the online exotic pet trade, where sellers offering to post spider eggs across the world or sneak reptiles on to planes are just a click away.

“The dimensions of trade have changed. Without monitoring it in a representative way, we cannot manage it,” said Alice Hughes, a professor at the University of Melbourne and lead author of the study. “At the moment, we are completely underestimating what modern trade looks like – for the pet trade and for the ornamental trade, we are not capturing it. And it poses a major risk to species.”

The study comes as the US-based nonprofit, the Center for Biological Diversity, filed a petition asking the US Fish and Wildlife Service to list the Javan slit-faced bat under the Endangered Species Act, warning that consumers are buying the bat for decor, placing it at risk of extinction. Taxidermy bats are sought after, particularly by US consumers, who are looking for gothic or spooky decorations for Halloween or Christmas gifts, the centre said.

The wildlife trade study identified 107,356 species that are either in use or traded globally – far higher than a previous estimate of about 50,000, which was made by the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES).

The study draws on more comprehensive datasets, as well as newer research papers that have tracked species sold online for decoration. It shows flaws in our understanding of what species are at risk; for example, the number of butterfly species found to be traded is greater than the IPBES’ entire estimate for all traded terrestrial invertebrates.

Molly Brown, programme officer for wildlife use and trade at the International Union for Conservation of Nature and a co-author of the paper, said the findings were a reality check. “The number of species that we are talking about is still an underestimate, and that’s really clear in the paper, because we cannot access and we do not have the type of monitoring data that we really need,” she said.

Discussions about the wildlife trade often focus on criminal activities, such as illegal smuggling of ivory or pangolin scales. However, the wildlife trade encompasses sectors such as fisheries and the timber trade as well as fashion and the sale of species as ornaments. This includes activities that may be sustainable, as well as trade that is driving species to extinction.

Even assessing the value of the legal trade compared with the illegal trade is challenging. The under-regulation of wildlife trade has created loopholes that allow species, including sought-after exotic pets, to be “laundered into legality”, researchers said.

Four years ago, nearly 200 countries agreed to ensure that trade of wild species was “sustainable, safe and legal”, as part of a landmark set of targets aimed at ending the destruction of nature. Efforts to meet these targets are hampered by a lack of data about what is being sold and where it originated.

The main data point for measuring progress on a globally agreed wildlife trade target refers only to fish stocks, which would account for at most 3% of all traded species, said Hughes.

Experts say there needs to be more systematic data collection and sharing. Globally, fisheries are monitored by the UN Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, while the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (Cites) monitors and regulates international trade in about 40,000 species to protect them from over exploitation.

However, researchers said that this excludes large numbers of potentially vulnerable species, warning the Cites system is too slow moving to keep up with new trends in threats to wildlife. Most countries lack any systematic data outside Cites, the study says. “Sometimes, it is years before things get listed and that means that they can be virtually extinct in the wild by that point,” said Hughes.

Species that are newly described are often rare and have a small range, meaning they are especially valuable to trade, and can be quickly wiped out.

Chris Shepherd, a conservation advocate at the Centre for Biological Diversity, who was not involved in the study, added that he had observed the wildlife trade for decades and that new species were continually appearing.

“The demand for wildlife, especially live wildlife traded for pets, is growing fast, as is the number of species involved,” he said. “This trade is pushing an ever-growing list of species towards extinction, and as such, putting in place mechanisms to better monitor this trade are essential.”