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<p>Combatting the illegal wildlife trade (IWT) is a priority for the UK Government
and the UK plays a leading role globally. We are investing over £36 million from 2014
to 2021 on action to counter IWT, including work to reduce demand, strengthen enforcement,
ensure effective legal frameworks and develop sustainable livelihoods.</p><p> </p><p>The
UK initiated and supported a series of international conferences, starting with the
first conference in London in 2014, to drive the fight to eliminate IWT and in October
last year brought together global leaders at the latest and most ambitious of these.
The conference brought a new focus and determination to tackle IWT as a serious organised
crime, to build coalitions and to close markets for illegally traded wildlife products.
Sixty-five countries, including the UK, have reaffirmed their commitment to counter
the illegal trade and have declared what further action they will be taking. Full
details of all the commitments made at the conference have been published in the 2018
London IWT conference declaration.</p><p> </p><p>New UK pledges made at the conference
which complement our existing initiatives in this area include the following commitments:</p><p>
</p><ul><li><p>an additional £6 million for the UK’s IWT Challenge Fund;</p></li><li><p>£900,000
of new funding to develop a British military counter-poaching taskforce;</p></li><li><p>£2.1
million for public-private partnerships in Indonesia, to secure and extend critical
habitats for species including the Sumatran tiger and Asian elephant;</p></li><li><p>£50,000
to support a new WILDLABS Tech Hub, which has since partnered with the Open Data Institute
to reduce the level of illegal trade of wildlife by sharing data to develop innovative
technologies;</p></li><li><p>up to £40,000 to create education packs for children
in multiple languages which will teach them about key conservation and IWT issues,
in partnership with Tale2Tail, a citizen ivory action group, and the WWF;</p></li><li><p>to
establish a new global consortium made up of specialists in demand reduction and behaviour
change, to make sure that our future work on IWT is as binding and effective as possible.</p></li></ul><p>
</p><p>At home we have passed tough new legislation to close our domestic ivory market.
The Ivory Act 2018 effects a total ban on commercial dealing in elephant ivory that
could directly or indirectly fuel poaching, with five narrow exemptions. When the
ban comes into force it will be the toughest in Europe and one of the toughest in
the world, with some of the strongest enforcement provisions.</p>
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