We must act now to stop extinction: Prince William issues rallying cry to halt illegal wildlife trade

Prince William today made his most powerful speech to date in his fight to stamp out the illegal wildlife trade.

Unless we act now, he said, many of our most treasured species — including wild elephants — will be wiped out.

The Duke of Cambridge made his passionate address at the third international conference on the illegal wildlife trade in Hanoi, Vietnam.

He said: “Halting the extinction crisis and ending the illegal wildlife trade presents a real chance to demonstrate our collective confidence that we have the power to rise to the big problems of our time.

"If we cannot tackle this, it is hard to see how we will be effective in overcoming the other global challenges that face us.”

The prince, who has made this mission his personal crusade, said illegal wildlife crime syndicates had become much more sophisticated and were more “agile” than the authorities.

“We are getting cleverer, but we need to admit that they are getting much cleverer as well,” he added. “The poachers are learning to be quiet and are much harder to track.”

His speech came as armed forces minister Mike Penning today announced that more British soldiers will be sent to Africa to step up the war against elephant poachers.

A 12-strong UK army team from 1 (UK) Division will be deployed to Malawi early next year to train park rangers as combat tracking instructors.

The mission could be extended to other countries in Africa where elephants are endangered.

In the past 17 months, British soldiers have been sent on two anti-poaching deployments to Gabon. In East Africa, the British Army Training Unit Kenya is funding a fence to deter poachers.

Mr Penning said: “We will support partners, including Malawi, to help stamp out organised crime and the evil menace of poaching.”

At the Hanoi conference, Environment Secretary Andrea Leadsom pledged £13 million to double the UK’s commitment to tackling the illegal wildlife trade.

In his speech William backed “people power”, saying citizens around the world had given campaigners hope by pressuring politicians to take action.

He and his wife, the Duchess of Cambridge, saw conservation efforts first hand when they fed orphaned rhinos and elephants at a national park in India during their tour in April.

At least two rhinos are killed every day and almost 150,000 African elephants have been lost to poaching in the past decade. This summer’s Great Elephant Census showed the African elephant population had declined 30 per cent in seven years.

“So while we’ve made progress, the truth is we are still falling behind,” William said. “A betting man would still bet on ... extinction.”

But he added: “We can win this battle. And in doing so we can take a small, but very important step in reminding ourselves that we are capable of rising to the challenges of our age.”

Create a FREE account to continue reading

eros

Registration is a free and easy way to support our journalism.

Join our community where you can: comment on stories; sign up to newsletters; enter competitions and access content on our app.

Your email address

Must be at least 6 characters, include an upper and lower case character and a number

You must be at least 18 years old to create an account

* Required fields

Already have an account? SIGN IN

By clicking Create Account you confirm that your data has been entered correctly and you have read and agree to our Terms of use , Cookie policy and Privacy policy .

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged in

MORE ABOUT