Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
valued by argali—threatens to exacerbate the species' refugee-like status. Argali appear
to tolerate close proximity only of domestic camels; all other human disturbance elicits
a similar response—finding elsewhere to graze, rest, and avoid predators. As highways,
mines, and tourist facilities increase on the plateau, these argali will find that fewer and
fewer of these “elsewheres” provide for their life-history needs.
GLOBALIZATION STRIKES BACK: CHIRU
Scanning through the popular media, it is not difficult to find reports of how demand for
wildlife products in China (or among overseas Chinese communities) is threatening species
living elsewhere. Most noteworthy of course, is the tiger, whose future as a wild species
is now threatened largely by the demand for its bones in traditional Chinese medicine
(notwithstanding recent Chinese laws banning the use of tiger parts or even claims of tiger
ingredients in any domestic product).
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Elsewhere, rhinos in Africa, saiga in Kazakhstan,
and even American black bears in the United States and Canada are reported—sometimes
accurately, sometimes with exaggeration—to be suffering from the insatiable Chinese
appetite for animal parts. But with the chiru (or Tibetan antelope),
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we have the situation
in reverse. Western China still maintains abundant habitat for the species, and hunting
for local subsistence use has never seriously threatened it. Instead, it is the increasing
ease with which products can be moved across borders, and the increasing mobility of
nonlocal Chinese poachers (generally made possible by wealth produced in the global
marketplace), that has turned population stability into population collapse, and in the
space of about a decade, transformed one of the most abundant large mammals in Asia
into a bone fide endangered species.
The chiru's conservation problem is closely related to its biology. Because it is su-
premely adapted to living in one of the world's coldest climates, it is endowed with a
down-like undercoat to keep it warm: to provide this high-density blanket, its hair diameter
is a minuscule 10 to 12 microns, even finer than that of the Andean vicuña (discussed
in note 21 in the earlier section on musk deer), and considerably finer than cashmere or
pashmina from the highest quality domestic goats.
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From this softest of all wools, artisans
in Kashmir have for centuries woven a product called shahtoosh, generally used for shawls
that have considerable cultural significance among wealthy Punjabi families. Although
these shawls have been in international trade since at least the eighteenth century, inter-
est among the fashion elite of Europe, Japan, and North America in shahtoosh remained
muted until about the mid-1980s. But at about that time, with increasing disposable in-
come, luxury interest in trendy products from places such as India, and trucks, gasoline,
and free time now available to would-be poachers within China, the stage was set for a
dramatic upsurge in sales of shahtoosh, which in turn fueled smuggling of chiru wool,
which in turn fueled poaching of chiru. As of 1996, raw shahtoosh sold to shawl weav-
ers in Kashmir went for $970 to $1,725/kg, and shawls in London commandeered from
$1,280 to a whopping $17,600 (for an extra-long version). (Adult male chiru also sport
beautiful, lyre-shaped horns between 55 and 65 centimeters long, which are a lustrous
black with a dozen or two knurled ridges; these horns are prized by many Tibetans and
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