NEWS
ACRES IN THE NEWS
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The New Paper
October 25 2003
Want a piece of real tiger?
Tiger bones, tiger paws, tiger penises - Singapore said to be main market for tiger parts smuggled in from Indonesia
by Teh Jen Lee
THERE are tiger parts - or what are said to be tiger parts - on sale in Singapore.
We know, because The New Paper went undercover to expose this illegal business.
We conducted three checks of Chinatown shops with members of the Animal Concerns Research and Education Society (Acres) in the past week.
Posing as interested buyers, we went in with a hidden camera.
The camera was in a bag. It had a small lens fixed next to a hole in the bag.
After less than 10 minutes of asking around, we found the first shop.
In the beginning, the shop assistant recommended ready-made concoctions in red-and-yellow boxes with lots of fine print.
When asked if they contained tiger parts, he said in Mandarin: 'Yes, all kinds of animals are used, but it can't be written down because tigers are protected.'
When pressed for actual tiger parts, he pointed us to his boss, who calmly took out a box from the display case.
Under the plastic lid was a dried penis with testes - dirty-yellow, and with a leathery texture. The shopowner pointed out the dark vein running the length of the organ and the small barbs at the end.
'You know how cats make so much noise when they have sex? It's because of the barbs. Tigers have them too,' said the man.
Based on a price of $20 per 'liang' (equivalent of 37.5g), it would cost over $400.
We then asked him about tiger bones. He said he would show us only if we were interested to buy.
When we nodded, he went to the back of the shop and took out a clear plastic bag containing four bones of various sizes. He got them from Indonesia 'a long, long time ago with other goods'.
'Twenty years ago, I sold a complete tiger skeleton to a Taiwanese for about $5,000 but I can't get any more stock now,' said the man.
We bought a small bone from him and went back two days later, claiming that soup made with the bone had been energising.
He then said: 'If you really want, can find some more, it's possible.'
That bone, weighing about 30g, had cost $28.50 (which works out to $950 per kg).
At the next shop, the price was twice as high because the stock was '100 per cent guaranteed'. The lady boss took out brown bones from a box. She showed us that it was labelled 'tiger bone'.
She said: 'We used to sell to Koreans, but it's very hard to find tiger bones now. These are from Kelantan, if you really want more, I can ask around. They may be able to shoot one and get it out.'
She put the bones back on the shelves behind her, and gave us her namecard should we decide to 'order a tiger'.
A man at the third shop showed us a few 'tiger bones', but insisted that he could not sell them because he needed to use them for making prescriptions.
When we insisted, he said he would check his storeroom to see if he had any to spare and asked us to come back a few days later.
On Monday, he not only took out $1,000 worth of tiger bones (about 380g), but also three paws, a tiger penis that he sells whole for $300, and small blocks of 'tiger paste' worth $100 each.
The dried paws were 'reserved' for a customer who wanted them for decorative purposes, with no claws missing.
All his 'goods' came from Indonesia, and he claimed to get new stocks every month.
'You have to use the parts as soon as possible after the tiger is killed, otherwise it's not as effective,' said the man.
But the tiger penis he showed us was very different from the one from the first shop, so which was real?
The answer came in an Agri-Food and Veterinary Authority of Singapore (AVA) e-mail which had pictures of fake tiger penises confiscated recently.
The first shop had probably been selling the penis of a bull.
So what about the 'tiger bone' that was unusually cheap?
Even an expert like Dr Oh Soon Hock, a Singapore Zoo vet-cum-Chinese physician, couldn't tell for sure.
It was definitely too big to be from a domestic cat, and it did look like the hind-thigh bone of a three-month-old tiger cub he once X-rayed.
He said: 'It's possible that it's real but there's just no way to tell.'
Tigers in Sumatra may well go extinct in less than 10 years. But poachers are still killing them because of the money involved.
A tiger can be chopped down to head, skin, organs, meat and bones that are sold separately. And each portion can cost hundreds of dollars.
Some Chinese physicians believe that tiger parts are a potent medicine to rejuvenate men and even cure impotence.
It is understood that some shops found selling or displaying fake tiger penises are being investigated.
The penalties for illegal import and possession of tiger parts are a maximum fine of $5,000 and/or jail term of one year.
The penalties for violating the domestic ban of selling tiger parts and products are a fine of up to $2,000 and/or a jail term of three months.
Since 1986, it has been illegal to import and export tigers under the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species in Wild Flora and Fauna (Cites).
Singapore also banned the sale and display of tiger parts, including pre-Cites stock which had been legally imported, in 1994.
Miss Lye Fong Keng, Head of AVA's Wildlife Regulatory Branch, said no-one has been caught smuggling tiger parts in the past five years.
Importers referred to AVA by the Health Sciences Authority must declare the list of ingredients in their products. Miss Lye said the aim was to ensure that the product does not contain parts of the tiger or other endangered species.
Pamphlets in Chinese have been given to traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) physicians, importers, manufacturers and retailers to educate them against using parts, products and derivatives of endangered species.
She added: 'Dialogue sessions have also been held to inform the Singapore TCM Committee of Cites regulations and prohibitions. AVA officers conduct surveys and spot-checks on TCM shops around different parts of Singapore.'
AVA works closely with the local police, Customs and local and international non-governmental organisations to curb the illicit wildlife trade.
The public can help with tip-offs by calling AVA at 6227-0670.
WILDLIFE OFFICIAL: TAKE ACTION AGAINST POACHERS AND DEALERS
TIGER business is lucrative business in Singapore.
'We do not carry out any investigation outside of Indonesia but wildlife traders and tiger hunters here tell us that Sumatran tiger bones are worth thousands in Singapore,' said Mr Sapto Sakti, senior manager of communications and outreach of the World Wide Fund for Nature in Indonesia.
At least 116 tigers were killed in Sumatra between 1998 and 2002, 42 of them in Riau province.
Riau's numerous ports act as exit points for smugglers to bring tigers to Singapore.
Illegal logging also shrinks the tiger's natural habitat, making it easier to hunt them.
Indonesia has already lost tiger species in Java and Bali, and less than 500 Sumatran tigers were recorded in 1999.
Ms Debbie Martyr of Fauna and Flora International in Kerinci Seblat National Park thinks the WWF figure is 'a considerable understatement' as it doesn't include data from other groups.
She believes that dealers in Singapore and Malaysia are buying tiger bone and pelts from Sumatra and selling it elsewhere.
'Tiger bone value rises sharply each time it is sold. Our data shows that a poacher may receive only US$17 ($29.60) per kg of tiger bone but this figure more than doubles by the time it reaches provincial capitals,' said Ms Martyr.
While it's important to destroy the consumer market, she wants to see more effective legal sanctions against poachers, brokers and big dealers.
Mr Chris Shepherd of Traffic South-east Asia, a wildlife trade monitoring network, said more funds are needed to train enforcement officers in Southeast Asian agencies in investigation techniques and how to identify tiger products.
He said: 'Tigers are in a really critical situation so better co-ordination and communication between countries are needed now. The people who work for AVA are good, but there's just not enough of them.'
DOCTORS say there is no scientific basis for the use of tiger parts to cure diseases.
Three urology specialists dismissed the belief that problems like erectile dysfunction (ED) can be cured by consuming tiger genitalia.
'It consists of nothing extraordinary except muscle, blood vessels and fats with no real remedy. What we recommend is a proper history and physical examination,' said Dr Lim Kok Bin, registrar of Singapore General Hospital's urology department.
Dr James Tan of Tan Tock Seng Hospital, who was the principal researcher in Singapore's first major study on ED, said it's all 'very mythical'.
'Drying or cooking the tiger penis, or soaking it in wine, will denature the hormones, so there will be no effect.'
Adjunct professor Peter Lim, medical director of Gleneagles' Andrology Urology and Continence centre, agreed: 'Even if you eat it raw, it will just be digested.
FOLKLORE
'It's Chinese folklore that believes that if you're weak in the leg, take chicken leg; if it's the brain, take fish brain.'
Dr Jean-Paul Ly, a vet who is also a clinical nutritionist, strongly advises against using that line of reasoning.
He said: 'There are many animal diseases that we haven't even begun to understand. We took decades to realise we could get BSE (the human form of mad cow disease) from beef. Why put yourselves at risk for nothing?
'Synthetic hormones available are of higher concentrations and they are safer. Most ED cases have nothing to do with hormones anyway, it's psychological.'
As for bone and joint problems, tiger bones have no proven value, said associate professor Wong Hee Kit, a senior consultant of the National University Hospital's orthopaedic surgery department.
In traditional Chinese medicine, tiger bone is believed to have anti-inflammatory effects in the treatment of arthritis and rheumatism.
While Dr Oh Soon Hock, who has been a Chinese physician since 1995, believes in its effectiveness, he said that people should use alternatives since tigers are so endangered.
He said: 'Instead of rhino horn, people used water buffalo horn. So something similar can be done for tiger bones.'
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