Collecting Permit Ideas

[Doug Yanega]

Mark Walker wrote:

>I'm not sure why you are so bent on this "no free Lep" thing, but I can live
>without an explanation for that.

That's easy enough to explain, actually, and it's all related. I'm speaking
from the viewpoint of the government officials who have the task of trying
to reduce the flow of commercially valuable wildlife out of their country.
I've talked with a few over the years, including folks patrolling the
desert in NE Mexico to keep the cactus rustlers at bay. They don't like to
leave loopholes for folks like that - they want the laws on the books to be
as tough as possible, so when they DO catch someone doing something wrong,
they have legal recourse to slap them. This same basic thing has even been
expressed by USFWS staff when they were asked whether certain restrictions
applied to insects or not ("They're not intended to, but we can't leave
loopholes...")
        Some countries are more paranoid than others, in the end, and
Brazil is pretty darn paranoid. But they've got foreigners trafficking
birds, orchids, frogs, monkeys, butterflies...so who's to say that paranoia
is not without foundation? YES it is tragic that there are people who ruin
things for everyone else, YES it would make me much happier if it were
possible to just let people do what they want, but when someone acts to
prevent exploitation, you have to acknowledge they have that right.
        They don't even like foreign researchers because of a LONG (and
sadly true) history of researchers who come, collect, pay lip service, then
take all the specimens back home, keep all the types, and don't even send
so much as a reprint to the Brazilians who hosted them. Given this, you
can't be all that surprised if they demonstrate little sympathy to people
offering promises of responsibility and cooperation.

>I think you are overexaggerating the need for a huge infrastructure.

I'm not talking about huge - probably around 20 full-time positions in a
country of millions, assuming you don't try staffing the parks. But 20
full-time positions that run at an average of at least $20K is $400K per
year for salaries alone, and no $100 permit is going to cover that expense,
since there aren't 5000 or more lepidopterists who are going to come every
year; that's something like 13 new permits that would have to be issued
every single day.

>You see, you emphasize the enforcement issue.

I think most governments see this as integral to anything that involves
trade in wildlife.

>What I'm talking about is a service to accomodate
>law-abiding and environmentally concerned individuals who are interested in
>collecting common species.

The original posting suggested a limit of 750-1000 specimens, and made no
claims to be restricted to "common" species, just things that aren't
listed. There are many rare and commercially valuable species that aren't
listed. Why should any government knowingly issue permits for $100 that
could easily be worth 5 to 50 times as much, with this profit going to some
other country? It's like expecting them to issue permits to bird fanciers
to collect 5 live birds as long as they're not listed. Like I said, it's a
matter of closing loopholes from an official perspective. The Brazilian
government KNOWS that Brazilian butterflies have a market value, and they
already have butterfly-specific regulations in place accordingly, even for
people doing research.

>Capturing anyone bent on violating or
>abusing such a process would require no more enforcement than what is
>already in place.

No. Enforcement is easier when ANYONE selling specimens is doing so
illegally. If you had permits, then middlemen dealing in large-scale
commercial traffic could continue getting their material from a host of
small sources, but these would NOW be *legal* sources, each with their own
personal permit. That would be abuse, and it would be perfectly legal. "No
loopholes" is a simpler policy.

Little else that really bears comment, aside from:

>I can't believe that a two page
>brochure can't be generated and funded by the permit fee (which I'm thinking
>would be something on the order of $100 U.S.).  If we need a bureaucracy to
>do this, then we've got larger problems than we're discussing here.

We *DO*!! That's one of my points!! No matter how simple and
straightforward anything seems to a layman, ANY government can find a way
to pervert the process into something labyrinthine, time-consuming, and
expensive. Didn't we all shake our heads when we found out the US military
was budgeting things like $250 hammers and $1000 toilet seats? What you or
I expect something should cost will never come close to the actual price
tag.

>Why would any country go to this trouble?  That is a very sad statement.

Indeed it is - we agree on that. Does that necessarily make it any less
reflective of reality?

>Why does any country ever go to any trouble?

Money and votes. Are there governments that - as an aggregate - are
motivated by anything else? Other than strictly *humanitarian* matters like
disaster relief and the like, can you really cite many examples of
countries giving money and resources away in the *absence* of a strong
public opinion? Somewhere, somehow, every action taken must yield money or
votes, or it won't be taken in the first place. It'd be nice if I was
mistaken, but I've yet to see any real evidence to the contrary. This may
seem like a digression, but it does indeed have bearing on the matter at
hand. I don't see how we can make progress if we don't take all these
things into account.

Peace,

Doug Yanega    Depto. de Biologia Geral, Instituto de Ciencias Biologicas,
Univ. Fed. de Minas Gerais, Cx.P. 486, 30.161-970 Belo Horizonte, MG   BRAZIL
phone: 031-449-2579, fax: 031-441-5481  (from U.S., prefix 011-55)
                  http://www.icb.ufmg.br/~dyanega/
  "There are some enterprises in which a careful disorderliness
        is the true method" - Herman Melville, Moby Dick, Chap. 82