The UB Post-Leading English News

The saker falcon is a large bird with a wing span of between 105-129cm. A carnivore, it lives almost exclusively in grassland. When diving for prey they are said to reach speeds of 200km/hr. Loved by falconers for their intelligence and their boldness as well as their beauty, they are so prized by Arab nations that a single bird could fetch hundreds of thousands of dollars. Alister Doyle, for Reuters, wrote in 2007 that in “Abu Dubai last year, officials reported that one man paid US$200,000 for an endangered falcon.” Though some regard this an overestimation, the U.C.R. reported that every year since 1991, a number of falcons have sold for several hundred thousand dollars, while a few sell for more than one million U.S. dollars.

While it is currently illegal to take the falcons from the wild in Europe, no such drastic restrictions have been enforced on Mongolia. The nation is allowed to export a number of birds each year, in compliance with CITES (Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora) and the CITES National Management Authority that issues permits to export wildlife. But due to a lack of initiative by the government, or the denial of true population numbers, or numbers compiled by rough and unreliable stocktaking, export numbers do not balance existing bird numbers. A report in 2000 to CITES reassuring the organization the Mongolian Government was breaking no rules or regulations by Kh. Badam of the Environmental Protection Agency and the Ministry of Nature and Environment, stated that the saker falcon “is widely distributed with a high population number.” In 2000 the bird had an estimated population in Mongolia of only 2,500.

The latest deal with the Emir is not the first time the Mongolian government been contracted to export the falcons. In 1994, the former Minister of the Environment, Batjargal, signed a deal with Abdul Latif Minda, emissary of a Saudi prince, to purchase 800 birds over a period of 10 years for an estimated US$ 2.2 million. Each year since, birds have traveled the thousands of kilometers to the Middle East. And not to any one country, or any one Emir. They are prized throughout the Arab nations.

In 1994 there were said to be over 10,000 birds in the wild steppes of the country, and a deal of such modest proportion made little dent to the bird’s numbers. Worldwide, in 1990, there were a liberally estimated 24,000 birds. Since then the numbers have declined by 53-75 percent, and in Mongolia, a tally taken in 2000 counted no more than 2,400 birds. That, according to the World Conservation Union, is a drop of almost 60 percent.

Though it seems there has been no official tally taken since 2003, conservationists and wildlife preservation organizations, realize inevitably numbers have fallen. At the 60 percent rate of decline calculated in 2000, the population of the saker falcon in Mongolia would stretch to - at best - a mere 1,000.

To help build the species, birds have been bred at farms domestically around the world, but are said to lack much of the natural hunting skills the wild animals are famed for. Alan Parrot, former breeder of saker falcons for Arab royalty -turned conservationist- in an article ‘Falcon Hunting Season’, states “At these farms only one out of ten birds can match a Mongolian one.” In the Middle East, amongst the men who hunt with the falcons, these birds are regarded as a status of success and manhood. Hence the reason Mongolian birds are so prized.

Understandably saker falcons are now, according to a number of international wildlife organizations, an endangered species. Birdlife International report the saker falcon “qualifies as Endangered because it has undergone a very rapid population decline, particularly on the central Asian breeding grounds, owing to unsustainable capture for the falconry trade, as well as habitat degradation and the impacts of agrochemicals.” In Mongolia it has come under threat for four main reasons. The first is the use of pesticides that poison the bird after they eat a contaminated rodent. The second, according to the World Conservation Union, is the “offtake for falconry… Estimated numbers of Sakers trapped annually for Middle East falconers are 4,000 Saudi Arabia, 1,000 Qatar and 500-1,000 each Bahrain, Kuwait and UAE.” (These figures do not represent Mongolia solely, they cover the entire expanse of nations the saker falcon inhabit, from Austria to India and up into the Russian Federation.) The third is electrocution as birds become entangled in overhead electricity wires. The fourth is illegal smuggling.

Smuggling of birds and their eggs is prolific in Mongolia due to a lack of policing and enforcement. By 2000, says Alan Parrot, “Mongolia ha[d] turned into the world center in the illegal trade of rare birds.” Though the report does not reference the country of origin, a CITE convention report published in 2003 stated that almost 6,500 birds are annually exported “without proper documentation, and that this level of harvest must be unsustainable.”

The recently published Wildlife Conservation Societies report Silent Steppe: The Illegal Wildlife Trade Crisis in Mongolia, writes “Today, Mongolia’s saker falcon population is threatened by illegal trapping, effects from Brandt’s vole poisoning, and electrocution … [but] it is likely that international trade is the greatest driver in population declines.”

This latest deal with the Emir was worth US$ 9,800 per bird. US$ 800 will go to local administrators and US$ 9,000 to the national government, officials have stated. The falcons were caught by a Saudi Arabian and Kuwaiti team headed by Fahad Al-Dhafir, a personal representative of the Saudi Arabia’s Emir. About 30 of the falcons will come from the Bayankhongor aimag.

Though Mongolia is signatory on the trade of endangered species, the government seems to care little for the rules and regulations. It has already received two written warnings from CITES. “Trade in the falcon”, says Amanda Fine, Head of Mongolia’s division of the Wildlife Conservation Society, “is larger than the government says and is hard to police.” While the government does not seemed too concerned about the birds plight, Fine says local herdsman and aimag leaders have expressed their worries to the foundation as they witness the rapid decline of a bird Mongols believe “symbolizes bravery and fortune.”

While the Mongolian government is within its rights to export the rare and much-prized bird, it seems the ambivalence of population research and a lack of concern to protect the species undermines the confidence organizations like CITES place in the nation’s environment ministries. As it wrote in 2003, “It is clear, that the current use of the Saker is unsustainable, with a time frame of 5-15 years maximum at these rates.” In 2008, the delivery of 240 endangered animals to the Middle East from the steppes of Mongolia can only dramatically deplete an already fragile and extremely limited species.