They called for campaigns to raise public awareness of the risk of wild animals hunting and trafficking by holding campaigns and including this subject in the school curriculum, especially in rural areas.

Tom Osbon of the Vietnam-based Wildlife Management Office stressed the need to legalise multi-sectoral co-operation in preventing, discovering and punishing forest violations in order to protect wild animals effectively.

“It’s also very important to establish special inspectors in localities which record a high number of violations,” he added.

As in many other developing countries, hunting and trading animals in Vietnam has been quite alarming, he said.

Restaurants in the central region consume nearly 2 million wild animals every year, and the annual demand for wild animal products nationwide is estimated at nearly 4,500 tonnes, according to a recent study by WCS.

Dr. Nguyen Viet Dung, deputy head of the Centre for People and Nature Reconciliation, said that the real number of violations of wild animal protection laws last year was much higher than 1,042 case as discovered by The Forest Protection Department.
 
Roberton added that Vietnam was also an important link in the international wild animal trafficking chain.

Over the last two years, authorities have discovered 57 cases of trafficking in wild animals involving more than 7,612 individuals including monkeys and Tibetan bears and elephant tusks.