Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask His Majesty's Government what steps they are taking to tackle the illegal wildlife trade; and what assessment they have made of the links between the illegal wildlife trade and financial crime.

£30 million has been invested between 2022 and 2025, including through Defra’s Illegal Wildlife Trade Challenge Fund. To date the fund has supported 179 projects in over 67 countries, including projects to change behaviours, strengthen wildlife crime legislation, and help communities to protect the wildlife they rely on for their livelihoods.

Domestically, UK Authorities, including the National Wildlife Crime Unit (NWCU) and UK Border Force, work closely together to combat illegal wildlife trade. This includes through joint enforcement operations (e.g. Operation Thunder), intelligence sharing, and the identification of enforcement priorities.

In 2021, the Home Office commissioned an independent assessment of illegal wildlife trade and financial crime in the UK. This is available here. This was followed by the first illegal wildlife trade risk assessment by the NWCU in 2022 - https://www.nwcu.police.uk/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/Initial-Risk-Assessment-of-IWT-Public-Version.pdf.