The wildlife trade is a multibillion-dollar industry that threatens biodiversity.
Exploiting wildlife by selling it, their parts or their products is one of the most profitable activities in the world. A group of researchers from the University of Helsinki spotlights the significance of all major taxonomic groups in the global wildlife trade and calls for action to fill in our gaps in knowledge. The group also lists nine actions anyone can take to fight the illegal wildlife trade.
Besides being a major threat to biodiversity, the wildlife trade can be a cause of global public health issues and hundreds of billions of dollars of economic damage around the world from disease outbreaks, as might be the case for COVID-19. Despite its major ecological and socio-economic importance, no comprehensive analysis has been made of the global patterns of the wildlife trade.
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