Protecting Pangolins

Thank you for donating to our Protecting Pangolins project. Your support helps to fund our ground-based conservation partners, who work to protect pangolins and change attitudes towards consuming wildlife products.

The main threat which faces the pangolin is the illegal wildlife trade, where pangolins are in high demand for their scales. In Traditional Chinese Medicine, pangolin scales are considered a delicacy and as a cure for all kinds of ailments, including arthritis, skin conditions and more. However, there is no scientific evidence to support these claims.

DSWF supports WildAid, an international organisation working in China and Vietnam who work to dispel myths on the healing properties of pangolin products, creating and sharing powerful messages in a variety of ways.

This year, WildAid worked with DreamWorks Animation to produce English, Vietnamese and Chinese versions of a public service announcement featuring Kung Fu Panda’s Po standing up for his friends, the pangolins. The PSA, which you can watch here, is part of a series of PSAs featuring Po and is being shown in airports, banks, shopping centres and in taxis across Vietnam.

Alongside this, WildAid has filmed video billboard messages which are appearing in nearly 500 places across China, addressing the use of pangolin scales by nursing mothers, aiming to debunk the belief that they increase lactation. The campaign has received over 25 million views on Chinese social media platform Weibo, and has been featured in the Chinese media.

Together with these huge viral campaigns, WildAid has collaborated with several Buddhist temples in Vietnam to coincide with Lunar New Year (known as Têt), urging Vietnamese citizens to begin their year positively by protecting endangered animals such as pangolins, rhinos and elephants.

These culture-changing projects have a huge impact on protecting pangolins: without consumer demand, endangered species lose their value in markets and no longer become desirable for poachers. Alongside preventing the illegal hunting of pangolins in source countries, reducing the demand for wildlife products in consumer countries can help to tackle wildlife crime at both source and destination.

Links:

• Our work with pangolins