Smugglers get rich on rare orchids

Press, 20 June 1986, Page 11

Smugglers get rich on rare orchids

Orchid smuggling between China and Hong Kong is big business but is causing havoc among rare and unique species. JAMIE ROBERTSON reports.

Orchid smugglers are having a devastating effect on rare and possibly unique species by exporting them in their hundreds of thousands from China. Experts say many of the strains that have come to Jight are new to science and the black market trade could have disastrous ecological effects. All orchids are classified as endangered. Most are sterile and others have a highly delicate reproductive system which depends on a precise environment. Seeds alone can fetch up to $BO,OOO, but propagated under correct laboratory conditioning they can produce as many as 5000 plants. Many collectors are too impatient to wait the 12 years it takes to produce a bona fide specimen. Instead they turn to the flourishing smuggling trade, where a single flower may cost some $450. Chinese alternative medicine also lays claim to the orchids. The belief in their amazing sexual powers lies deeply entrenched in mythological lore. Another victim of the tragic business is the Chinese peasant ; ■ f

farmer, exploited by the black marketeers, who pay him more money than he could hope to make in a lifetime to destroy his own environment. Once uprooted from their natural habitat and in the hands of the smugglers, the fragile flowers stand slim chance of survival. During flower festivals in Hong Kong they can be seen matted in thick carpets, carelessly bundled together for import. Now a concerned group of British expatriates have clubbed together to bring pressure to bear on Chinese and Hong Kong authorities to try to stamp out the business. They have alerted Kew Gardens in London which co-ordi-nates a worldwide orchid protection movement. The Chinese Academy of Science in Peking has also been notified. Dr Mo Weatherhead, orchid research worker at the University of Hong Kong, says: “Many of these orchids are very, very rare, even unique. The trade has got to be stopped. "It could have disastrous effects. We are losing plant species F

at a rate of knots worldwide. That means their genetic diversity, which should be kept to gene banks around the world, is also being lost and we will never know how the plant comes to be disease resistant, so many of these super new breeds are wiped out at a stroke by one bug.”

The orchid lobby is also infuriated that the Hong Kong authorities keep plants impounded in their stock rooms, waiting for a case to come to court, without giving them the kind of professional care that the precious blooms require. China is a signatory to the Washington Convention which forbids the export of endangered flora and fauna. It says it is educating customs officials in plant identification, and trying to teach the public about environmental awareness. Hong Kong’s Department of Agriculture and Fisheries claims the issue is “sensitive” and refuses to talk about it in detail. Legislation on the matter is fraught with difficulties. Smugglers, many suspected to be from Hong Kong’s powerful Triad gangs, continually slip through legal loopholes. Problems even arise in defining whether an orchid is wild or from a person’s collection. Copyright — London Observer Service.