Wildlife Trade

How extensive is the global trade in medicinal plants?
Plants were the first medicines, and even as modern humans have developed sophisticated pharmaceutical chemicals to treat illnesses, medicinal plants remain an important tool for treating illness in most cultures. Hundreds, if not thousands, of plant species are harvested for their medicinal properties all over the world. In some regions, traditional medicines made from local plants and animals are the only available and affordable treatment. The World Health Organization estimates that 80 percent of the world's population depends on traditional medicine for their health needs. In many developed countries, traditional herbal remedies are making a comeback as alternatives to conventional medicine. In the United States, the number of people using herbal medicines has increased from 2.5 percent in 1990 to 37 percent in 2000. Collecting medicinal plants for sale is an important income source for poor rural communities around the world. Unfortunately, today the commercial demand for these medicines exceeds supply in many cases, and the unregulated collection of these plants has the potential to endanger plant species' survival in the wild.

Does this trade threaten any plant species with extinction?
With so many plant species in use around the world, documenting population levels and the impact of collection for trade is very difficult. Some species have been studied extensively; others have yet to be given scientific names, or even discovered. Nevertheless, given the expanding use of herbal remedies and the rapidly growing population-along with the fact that very little cultivation of medicinal herbs is practiced-it is reasonable to conclude that collection of medicinal plants is often unsustainable. The very fact that so little is known about the impact of trade on medicinal plants indicates that there is little monitoring of collection and population levels. TRAFFIC has studied the use of medicinal plants in Europe, the United States, Africa, and Ecuador, concluding in each case that a number of plant species are threatened as a result of uncontrolled collection.

In Ecuador, one of the most well-known medical herbs in the world, Cascarilla cinchona pubescens - the original source of the potent anti-malarial drug quinine-may be threatened as a result of overexploitation. Today the herb is used to treat a variety of ailments, from upset stomach to immune system problems. In Eastern Europe, unsustainable collection of the wild herb Pheasant's eye, Adonis vernalis - which is used to treat cardiac ailments - has led to dramatic declines throughout the plant's range, and today the species is protected from collection in many countries. Orchids are an important ingredient in traditional Chinese medicines (TCM); each year, tens of thousands of orchids, especially of the genus Dendrobium, are used to make TCM products that are then shipped to Hong Kong for consumption. In the United States, American ginseng, Panax quinquefolius, and Goldenseal, Hydrastis canadensis, are collected in the wild in large quantities. Although much of the ginseng exported from the United States is now cultivated, enough collection of the wild plant occurs that trade in the species is now carefully regulated. Both ginseng and goldenseal are listed on Appendix II of CITES, The Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora, which regulates international trade through a permitting system.

Which countries are involved in the medicinal plant trade?
With their large populations and ancient heritage of traditional herbal-based medicines, China and India are two of the world's largest markets for medicinal plants. About 90 percent of the ginseng, or approximately 30 million plants, exported from the United States each year goes to countries in East Asia. The United States is also a major market for herbal medicines, importing hundreds of thousands of tons of herbs each year to support its $3 billion market. Other major consumers include Germany, France, Italy, Spain, and the United Kingdom. Europe as a whole imports one-quarter of the world's trade in herbal medicines, around 440,000 metric tons. Major producers of herbal medicine include the United States, Germany, Bulgaria, Poland, Japan, Madagascar, and Sudan.

Is the trade in medicinal plants regulated?
International trade in about 20 plant species is already regulated because of the pressures of herbal medicine. An additional 200 plant species used in herbal remedies are regulated in trade because of a combination of factors, including pressure from the herbal medicine market. In Europe, many countries regulate or prohibit trade in species whose populations have evidenced decline in recent years. Over 340 medicinal and aromatic plant species are fully or partially protected by the combined legislation of Bulgaria, France, Germany, Hungary, Spain and Turkey. However, in many countries where endangered medicinal plants are found - particularly in Africa and Latin America - there is insufficient legislation protecting these species, and what laws exist are often inadequately enforced.

Is there significant illegal trade in medicinal plants?
Given that there is so little regulation or monitoring of legal trade in countless medicinal plants, illegal trade is not generally a significant problem. In the cases where medicinal plant species are protected from trade, smuggling occurs if the plants are rare and valuable enough to risk the consequences. For example, wild Asian ginseng, which grows only in two provinces of far-eastern Russia and one province of China, is protected from trade in these two countries. But the finest specimens of wild Asian ginseng sell for tens of thousands of dollars per kilogram. These high prices create a tremendous incentive for poachers, and as many as 600 kilograms of wild ginseng are smuggled out of Russia every year. In the United States, trade in wild American ginseng has been regulated for decades, but poaching inside national parks still occurs.

How can we protect endangered species of medicinal plants from unregulated trade?
Wildcrafting, or sustainable and ethical harvest of wild populations of medicinal plants, ensures that over-collection does not occur. With demand for herbal medicines continuing to increase, another way to protect wild populations of medicinal plants is to increase the supply of cultivated specimens. Herbal plant cultivation is underway in Europe, but it is still in the experimental phase in the United States, and has barely been attempted in Africa and Latin America. Increasing the amount of cultivated herbs available will decrease the pressure on wild plant populations. Unfortunately, cultivation has historically been attempted only when wild populations were already threatened by over-exploitation. With so little monitoring of the impact of wild-collection on the world's medicinal plant species, collectors and cultivators may not act until it is too late. Much more research is needed to identify the status of the world's medicinal plant populations, to protect species at risk, and to create sustainable management plans for those species for which wildcrafting is an acceptable option.

Consumers of herbal medicines can help prevent the overexploitation of endangered plant species by asking retailers-pharmacies, health food stores, on-line vendors-to offer evidence that the herbs they sell were collected sustainably or from cultivated specimens. Currently there is no system for identifying the source of herbal medicines; by becoming aware and adding their voices to the debate, consumers can be a powerful force for conservation.