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Mobile app launched to help stop wildlife trafficking
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A baby orangutan sits in a tree in a Kalimantan forest. (Shutterstock/-)
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mobile application that could help the public to rescue endangered animals from being trafficked has been released in Indonesia, one of the most biodiverse countries in the world yet also home to many endangered animals.
Currently, Indonesia leads the world in terms of threatened mammals, with 135 species, which is nearly a third of all its native mammals.
Realizing the critical condition of wildlife in Indonesia, the ASEAN-Wildlife Enforcement Network (ASEAN-WEN) launched the WildScan app in the country on Wednesday.
The app, developed over three years by wildlife protection NGO Freeland with funding from the US Agency for International Development (USAID), encourages people to be aware of the animals in their surroundings, much like Nintendo’s augmented-reality game Pokémon Go. However, in WildScan, the aim is to protect the animals, not catch them.
“We developed WildScan to help identify many trafficked species in the region,” WildScan project manager Matthew Pritchett said during a press launch in Jakarta.
The app is designed to make it easy for people to find the animals they are looking for as it contains information and high-resolution pictures of more than 500 endangered species.
“Let’s say you’re in Jakarta and you saw a bird coming from Brazil. Of course you don’t know that the bird is from Brazil. So we came up with a very easy tool to narrow down the potential of animals you’re looking at,” Pritchett said.
By clicking on the wizard button on the app, users are asked a series of questions. “They will ask you whether it’s an animal or product, whether they have fur or skin, the color, etc. And then they will ask you how big it is. Is it smaller than your hand? Bigger than you? Does it have any special feature like wings or beak?” said Pritchett.
(Read also: Govt to revise wildlife law as protected animals face extinction)
After entering all the information, the app will display animals that match the criteria. Users can then click on the picture that best represents the animal about which they want more information. “So the first thing it shows you is the name of the bird and the endangered status. So you will know right away that they’re not supposed to be shipping that,” Pritchett said.
Once you know that the animal is illegal, you can use the app to file a report with officials. The only thing that a user needs to submit is a photo of the animal, while the rest is optional.
“We realize that everyone must want to report something different. So if you’re a tourist, you might just say a bird is on sale. But if you’re a law enforcer, you want a more detailed report which will help you. So it’s completely up to you how much information you want to put on the report,” said Pritchett.
Such an easy-to-use tool is critical in responding to wildlife trafficking cases as even law enforcement officials sometimes find it difficult to correctly identify endangered species, according to the Environment and Forestry Ministry.
“In Lampung, there were a couple of hundred trafficked birds but the personnel on the ground found it difficult to identify whether the birds were protected or not. So we had to summon a bird expert from Bandung. But by the time he arrived, the birds had already died due to stress. Therefore, this app will help,” said the ministry’s deputy director of forest protection in Java and Bali, Achmad Pribadi.
He added that the ministry would issue letters to regional administrations telling them to use the app immediately. (kes)
