Thailand Trade Pushes Tiger Penis Pills

BANGKOK, Thailand, June 18, 2001 (ENS) - Authorities in Thailand are failing to enforce domestic and international legislation that bans trade in tiger body parts, a new report by undercover investigators from the Environmental Investigation Agency reveals. As a result, tiger parts, tiger penis pills, and tiger bone pills are widely available in Bangkok and across the borders with Cambodia, Burma and China.

Tigers like this one are being pushed to extinction by deman for their body parts. (Photo courtesy EIA)

The Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA) is calling on the CITES Steering Committee to immediately dispatch a technical and political mission to Thailand to review legislation and enforcement activities it did during a previous series of missions from which Thailand was omitted.

Thailand's domestic legislation bans the hunting of wild tigers and trade in parts whether wild or captive bred. Under the CITES treaty to which Thailand is a signatory, all international commercial trade in tigers is banned.

The report reveals that Thailand has a thriving trade in both the import and export of tiger products and derivatives, and an established domestic industry manufacturing tiger products for a growing internal and international market. Customers believe that ingesting tiger penis pills will make them more virile, and tiger bone pills are believed to relieve symptoms of rheumatism.

Products found for sale include raw tiger bone at $6.60 per gram, tiger bone pills at $5.20 and $2.04, tiger penis pills at $6.40, and tiger based compound, locally known as "yao gao" to mix with liquor at $5.40. Some store owners claimed the tiger parts came from China, but others admitted to EIA investigators that their products are secretly made in Thailand and exported to China.

EIA identified three Thai factories: Zung Seng Heng16, Ouay Un and Heng Tien Huat, which manufacture and distribute tiger based derivatives for a domestic and international market.

Thailand is not the only country trading in tiger parts. Here an EIA investigator is offered tiger bone in Vietnam. (Photo courtesy EIA)

"Illegal trade from captive bred tigers poses an increasing threat as it fuels a demand for tigers on the international black market, and while this exists the few tigers left in the wild will not be safe," Banks said.

In 1995 the Thai government stated "it is [our policy] to suppress the trade in tiger parts and to investigate any claim of tiger parts being used or sold in Thailand for any reason."

But the EIA report documents the complete lack of transparency regarding the regulation and monitoring of Thailand's tiger breeding centers, including the world famous Sri Racha Tiger Zoo. Banks says this raises serious concerns internationally regarding the purpose and activities of these centers.

Tourist holds a baby tiger at the Sri Racha Tiger Zoo (Photo courtesy Asia Properties)

The tiger's global population has plummeted by 95 percent in the last 100 years. The tiger is critically endangered, there may be fewer than 5,000 tigers left in the wild.

Thailand was widely considered to be the primary range of the Indo-Chinese sub-species of tiger. In 1998 there was an estimated 250 to 501 Indo-Chinese tigers left in the wild. Now there may be as few 150, the EIA report estimates.

Between 1990 and 1994, Thailand imported 1650 cartons of tiger based derivatives from China. From 1977 to 1997, 58 shipments of tiger derivatives were seized being exported from Thailand to Europe, New Zealand, Australia and the Philippines. No recent data is available because Thailand has failed to submit annual reports on trade in animals and their parts for 1998 and 1999.

EIA is calling on the government of Thailand to immediately investigate and close down factories producing tiger bone products. The conservation organization is urging the Thai government to comply with CITES recommendations to amend existing legislation to include the prohibition of the sale of products claiming to containing tiger parts or derivatives.