The illegal wildlife trade is estimated to be valued between USD50-150 billion per year, and is among the five most lucrative global crimes. It fuels instability and criminality in both demand and supply countries. The transport industry and customs authorities can become involved, often unwittingly, with those who traffic wildlife products – such as ivory, rhino horn and pangolin scales.

United for Wildlife, a project of The Royal Foundation, was established by Prince William, Duke of Cambridge in 2012 to save endangered species and combat illegal wildlife trade. In 2014, the Duke of Cambridge announced the formation of the United for Wildlife Transport Taskforce, with the objective of engaging the transport sector in identifying and developing relevant and targeted solutions to wildlife trafficking. The Taskforce brought together transport stakeholders including airports, shipping companies and airlines with law enforcement and other agencies, such as Border Force and Royal Mail, to identify and facilitate action led by the private sector.

Since its inception, the United for Wildlife Transport Taskforce has been working to facilitate collaboration between the transport sector and law enforcement to prevent wildlife trafficking across the world. With five seizures of illegal wildlife products, eight alleged wildlife traffickers arrested and 23 law enforcement investigations supported by the Transport Taskforce information sharing system, the first few years of have been a success.

Last year the Duke of Cambridge announced the formation of a new taskforce, the Financial Taskforce. Comprised of representatives from financial institutions and experts on illegal wildlife trade, the taskforce will leverage the existing global financial crime architectures, as well as specific work already done by a number of financial institutions to support efforts to combat IWT and disrupt criminal networks.

DLA Piper is the primary legal adviser to both Taskforces. Our team at DLA Piper has been providing specialist transportation law pro bono legal advice to The Royal Foundation United for Wildlife project since its inception in 2014. More recently the firm has been providing financial and regulatory pro bono legal advice to the United for Wildlife Financial Taskforce.

This week, the Transport Taskforce and the Financial Taskforce held its first joint meeting to highlight the important work of United for Wildlife in the fight against the illegal wildlife trade.

To learn more, contact Richard Obank, The Royal Foundation client partner.