TNRC Partner Resource TRAFFIC Report

Countering Wildlife Trafficking through Tanzania’s Seaports

This 2019 report by TRAFFIC outlines vulnerabilities in transportation and customs capabilities that are exploited by criminal traffickers to move illicit wildlife products. African seaports that serve regional and international trade provide traffickers with multiple smuggling routes, and the container shipping industry particularly facilitates the movement of illicit goods. This report offers evidence from two seaports in Tanzania—Dar es Salaam and Zanzibar—on their involvement in wildlife trafficking. It also touches on the corruption that may be associated with organized criminal groups who orchestrate trafficking of wildlife, timber and fish.

Conservation and natural resource management practitioners, members of the enforcement community and private sector stakeholders will find this information valuable for better understanding the operating methods of organized crime groups in East Africa and their abuse of the sea transport system. Corruption in transport must be addressed as a central part in any approach to tackling wildlife trafficking, alongside concerted commitments from the highest levels of Government to customs and law enforcement officials to defeat the illegal wildlife trade.

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Image attribution: © naturepl.com / Jen Guyton / WWF; © Brian J. Skerry / National Geographic Stock / WWF; © Georgina Goodwin / Shoot The Earth / WWF-UK; © Hkun Lat / WWF-Aus