Collecting Permit Ideas

[DR. JAMES ADAMS]

Dear Listers,

           It is extremely rarely that I disagree with Doug, and, for 
the most part, I don't disagree with what he has to say about the 
permitting situation, in Brazil or otherwise.  But I am going to 
disagree with a couple of things.

Doug Yanega wrote: 

> . . .This means that you are asking that the government of Brazil expend money
> on, among other things, employing a number of people (since it requires
> employees whose ONLY job is to deal with these permits) on a year-round
> basis

I can't imagine that the permitting administrative structure would be 
like this in many coutries; I know, for instance, that it is not this 
way in Mexico (though that does not mean it's easy to get permits) or 
Guatemala.  Why does Brazil have such an antiquated policy that would 
require employess whose ONLY job would be dealing with these permits?

Doug also wrote:

>. . . Or would you approve if the permit
> itself was cheap, allowed unlimited catch, but when you left Brazil, you
> were assessed a fee - which you HAD to pay - of, say, half the open market
> value of the insects you had collected? (Hmmm...thirteen Agrias and twenty
> Prepona, plus 522 miscellaneous...you have a lot of cash, I hope, amigo?).

Two points:

1.  I have a real problem with the "market value" approach, though I 
understand the logistics of it.  Assessing a dollar value to 
specimens is subjective at best, and misses some very important 
points.  If the Brazilian (or any) government was really *concerned* about the 
market value of its insects, then it should assess *itself* an 
incredible penalty for all the insects it destroys on a yearly basis 
for "development" of natural areas, or they should penalize whomever 
is doing the development.  When it comes right down to it, when 
insects are removed from whereever they're removed from, what really 
matters to the ecology of the area are the materials within the 
bodies of the insects that are removed, and most of us would admit 
that even if you remove 1000 insects, the overall biomass that has 
been removed is very small.  Of course we need to be concerned about 
CITES species -- removing these species could be detrimental to 
population levels, but most species of insects have incredible 
replacement potential.

2.  Many species have NO market value, or at least no assignable 
market value.  Where do you go to find the market value of an 
unidentified (and perhaps unidentifiable) brown noctuid??  Perhaps 
I'm too much of an optimist, but I would bet that the vast majority 
of collectors are interested in doing just that -- collecting, NOT 
selling.  Here is not the time to discuss the collecting debate, but 
it seems to me that what REALLY needs to be regulated more carefully 
are the commercial aspects of collecting.  The fact that just about 
anyone can buy and sell specimens is what ultimately leads to 
commercial collecting in large numbers.  You limit the selling and 
buying to licensed farmers, as Doug suggests below, you limit the 
traffic (I understand perfectly the concept of black markets -- it 
doesn't make them any more legal).  Please be aware that, as Doug 
said, this is also off the top of my head, so I may have not 
considered these items as carefully as I should have.

Doug said:
>         Note that you can't simply have a booth in the airport that sells
> permits as you fly in, and checks your catch when you leave. That would
> leave the system too open to abuse, since you could collect anything,
> anywhere, even Red-listed species in National Parks, and just lie to the
> guy in the booth.

This problem, of course, already exists and always will exist.  There 
is no way financially to get appropriately trained people into all of the 
positions where it is necessary to have them, which probably means it 
will always remain difficult to get permits.  Sigh.

Doug said:
> Further, if it's not legal to collect anywhere in Brazil,
> then they can just catch you at customs - but if general permits exist,
> then all it takes is a little sly mislabeling for you to collect anywhere
> and get away with it - and that doesn't help either science OR Brazil's
> parks.

This, again, is a problem that already exists, and I don't have a 
good way to solve it.  Wouldn't it be nice to live in a world where 
appropriate information about *collected* specimens would be 
exchanged freely??  Don't hold your breath.

Doug said:
> But I digress...if you want the person in the booth to be able to
> spot when you're lying, then they'll need to have serious training in
> entomology, and that won't come cheap, especially since you'd need at least
> two such people in every international airport in the country.

This makes me angry, too.  Unfortunately, people will be people, and 
you can't trust all people to do what they *say* they will do.  
Untrustworthy people mucking it up for the rest of us, but that's 
just the way life is.  Doens't it piss you off?!?

Doug said:
>         In the end, economically, it's tough to make this pay when the
> market is so small (I think you overestimate how many tourism dollars
> butterfly collecting would generate for Brazil - a few riverside "jungle
> lodges" and river tours don't amount to much), and ecologically, it's
> simpler to just not allow collecting.

>From an economic standpoint, I have no arguments with what Doug says, 
and I guess when it comes right down to it, the situation always 
comes back to one of economics.  As Doug says, it IS simpler to not 
allow collecting.  Simpler is not always better, however.

Doug said:
> It might be different if Brazil was
> actually reimbursed for the market value of insects collected - that is,
> after all, only fair (you wouldn't just let people take produce from your
> garden and sell it on the street outside your house). 

As above, the "market value" business still bothers me.  For the most 
part, the government in any country has done NOTHING active in 
producing the country's insect fauna, and to say that some GOVERNMENT 
deserves monetary compensation for something that the government has 
done nothing to produce is NOT like saying that I deserve something 
for produce from my garden, but like saying that I deserve monetary 
return if someone pulls a WEED from my garden.  And yet, don't get me 
wrong.  I actually do believe a country deserves some monetary return 
(hence, a fee for collecting permits), but what they deserve more are 
vouchers and appropriate scientific information sent to people in the 
scientific community who can USE it.  Also, I do think collecting needs to 
be regulated to protect everyone from unscrupulous collectors and 
dealers, so what do you do in the end?

Doug said:
>. . . Ideally it would be different, I'll admit.

Who wouldn't agree with this?!?

Doug said:
>. . . the lodge employees take the
> butterflies THEY catch, to mount and label them for sale. When you leave,
> you have a bill of sale for every specimen you take with you. That is also
> a win-win scenario, involves no permitting process at all, AND reduces the
> incentive for poaching. Any serious objections?

Farming is an excellent idea, don't get me wrong.  It is a win-win 
scenario for those people who CAN'T make it to a given area of the 
world.  However, and this is just a personal observation, this walk- 
in-&-buy your insects approach defeats the whole purpose, as far 
as I'm concerned.  You might as well just have a store in your 
hometown that does this. This removes the excitement of exploration and 
discovery, which is the whole reason I take trips.  To be restricted 
to tours led by someone along well-beaten paths with a bunch of other 
people . . .  yow.  Not that I don't enjoy tours with other people!!  
I know, I know.  There's still no way around those people who would 
go in and collect unscrupulously, taking as many specimens of some 
species as they could get, or collecting CITES species.  

The point?  There IS NO easy solution.  Sigh.

            James Adams