This third edition of UNODC’s quadrennial World Wildlife Crime Report aims to provide a tool to assess and improve responses to this hugely damaging form of criminal activity. The present report covers trends in the illicit wildlife trade analyses harms and impacts probes driving factors and takes stock of responses. Wildlife crimes are diverse and often devastating in their impact and consequences. They hamper conservation efforts damage ecosystems and contribute to undermining our planet’s capacity to mitigate climate change. They also infringe on the essential needs income opportunities and cultural rights of local communities and corrode governance and the rule of law. Global recognition of this damage has grown steadily and after two decades of concerted action there is some cause for optimism. There has been tangible success against trafficking of some iconic species while cross-border cooperation and criminalization of wildlife crime have both improved.

The trafficking of wildlife is increasingly recognized as both a specialized area of organized crime and a significant threat to many plant and animal species. The World Wildlife Crime Report 2016 takes stock of the present wildlife crime situation with a focus on illicit trafficking of specific protected species of wild fauna and flora and provides a broad assessment of the nature and extent of the problem at the global level. It includes a quantitative market assessment and a series of in-depth illicit trade case studies.