Corruption in the use of permits and allocation of access rights

The challenge

Governments commonly act as the “gate-keeper” responsible for managing the exploitation of and trade in wildlife including forestry and fisheries. Companies, communities, individuals, and others who wish to access, harvest or trade wildlife must obtain the necessary rights and permits. The significant revenue generated, combined with the discretionary power often afforded to government employees makes this sector highly vulnerable to corruption by those with power and those wishing to exploit and trade wildlife (OECD, 2020a).

The right to access wildlife typically involves applying for concessions, tenure or harvest rights (hereafter termed “access rights”). Licenses may be needed for breeding wildlife or developing plantations. Permits may be required to process wildlife, for domestic transportation, international import/export, and to verify the health of the wildlife, among other stages.

The recipients of permits or access rights may be public or private companies, community groups, private individuals or other entities. Access rights may be subject to competing claims, as shifting attitudes, political arrangements or market conditions variously give precedence to and de-prioritize different communities’ and stakeholders’ access

The role of corruption

This brief focuses on the stages in a wildlife supply chain where permits for harvest or trade are issued, inspected or accepted, or where access rights are allocated. Permits or access rights are of course just one element in the exploitation, management and trade in wildlife that can be corrupted (Zain, 2020). However, they are vulnerable due to the interaction required between public authorities and the (potential) recipients of permits or access rights (CoP17 Doc. 28, 2016; UNODC, 2019a). Some characteristics of the wildlife trade mean these stages are particularly vulnerable to corruption.

The impact of corruption

Managing permits and access rights fairly should mean harvest and trade adhere to government regulations, including those on sustainability, legality and disease risk, and that exploitation of wildlife can be tracked and monitored. Governments should benefit by collecting a fair amount of revenue from licensing fees and taxes on legitimate harvest and trade. Recipients of access rights and permits should be confident that they will be awarded, inspected and accepted fairly, and they should understand the criteria upon which any decisions are based.

Corruption undermines the best efforts of those governments, international bodies, companies and civil society who are working to regulate the wildlife trade effectively by:

• Enabling unsustainable and illegal exploitation and trade of wildlife, which reduces species populations and threatens human livelihoods that depend on the legal use of them.
• Negatively influencing the design of policies and regulations that control access and trade of wildlife.
• Misdirecting public money to private companies and individuals, therefore depriving the government of revenue that should have been invested back into public services and conservation.
• Posing a risk to human, livestock and wildlife health if it leads to regulations being circumvented, such as corrupt issuing of false health or phytosanitary certificates in return for a bribe. The Covid-19 pandemic highlights the risk zoonotic diseases pose to health and the global economy (Broad, 2020) underlining the importance of regulations being adhered to. (See WWF & TRAFFIC, 2015).