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SCMP Reporter

HONG KONG is being used as a staging post to smuggle rhinoceros horn and other products to huge illegal stockpiles in China and Taiwan, according to environmental activists.

  The Environmental Investigation Agency, an international concern group on animal conservation, said yesterday that Hong Kong businessmen were the major operators in illegal deals between the countries.

  In June, the agency conducted an undercover operation that revealed that 59 out of 90 Chinese pharmacies surveyed in Hong Kong had rhino horn, hide or patent medicines.

  Rhino horn, prized for its medicinal properties, was found in 20 per cent of the pharmacies surveyed; rhino hide in 32 per cent; and patent medicine containing rhino horn in 47 per cent.

  The agency has recommended that the 120-member Convention on International Trade in Endangered species (CITES) place mandatory sanctions against Hong Kong at its standing committee meeting in March next year, if the British and Hong Kong Governments failto curtail the illegal trade.

  It has also recommended the establishment of an enforcement unit with police powers similar to South Africa's Endangered Species Protection Unit, and research into substitutes for the products.

    The Agriculture and Fisheries Department yesterday admitted that it had difficulty locating illegal products, although it said Hong Kong had the strictest legislation banning the rhino trade in the region.

  Department Assistant Director Frank Lau Sin-pang said several endangered species had come under the control of legislation, making it difficult to police one specific group.

  The department yesterday seized two horns, valued at $100,000, and 76 boxes of Chinese medicine claiming to contain rhino products from two pharmacies in Mongkok and one in Central.

  In the first nine months of the year, the department surveyed 1,000 pharmacies and seized 34 small packets of Chinese medicine containing rhino products and four small vials of medicine.

  Mr Lau said he believed the $25,000 maximum penalty for the offence was adequate.

  The last person to be punished in Hong Kong received a $3,000 fine in 1989 for illegally possessing 18 rhino horns.

  Mr Lau said the department's powers and the penalties might be reviewed after talks with the Customs and Excise Department and the agency today.

  The agency's executive director, David Currey, said pharmacies were either selling rhino products directly to the public or using Hong Kong as a port to repackage them.

  He said stockpiles existed in China and Taiwan but the trade extended as far as Thailand, South Korea and Yemen.

  The agency's investigations revealed that Hong Kong dealers, acting for Taiwanese buyers, had recently visited Guangzhou and other areas of southern China to explore the possibility of buying rhino horn stocks.

  Businessmen chose to deal in illegal rhino products because of the high profits and low risk compared with the drug trade, Mr Currey said.

  The average price of rhino horn in Hong Kong was US$24,570 (HK$190,000) a kilogram; patent medicine US$3.90 a box; rhino hide US$768 per kg; tiger penis US$2,000 per kg, and bear gall US$9,440 per kg, he said.

    The agency's Hong Kong representative, Heena Patel, said local Chinese pharmacies offered her horns and products from rhinos without asking for a prescription. The products were openly on display.

  ''These people who claim to be healers are responsible for the large and extremely lucrative trade,'' she said.

  ''The agency and Earth Care have opened dialogue with traditional Chinese healers who have been very receptive to the problem.''   Mr Currey said it was also illegal to offer fake horns for sale.

  In China, the agency discovered a stockpile of between 300 and 400 rhino horns - equivalent to the number of rhinos left in Zimbabwe.

  Chinese dealers told the agency they could buy African horn for US$1,400/kg and Asian for US$10,000/kg.

  ''The dealer said he could take it to the border with a military escort,'' Mr Currey said.

  China and Taiwan have already been threatened by CITES with sanctions for their continuing trade in rhino and tiger products.



So-called healers push endangered species closer to the edge of extinction