International law and lions (Panthera leo): understanding and improving the contribution of wildlife treaties to the conservation and sustainable use of an iconic carnivore

Abstract

The lion (Panthera leo) is featuring ever more prominently on the agendas of international wildlife treaties like the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) and the Convention on the Conservation of Migratory Species of Wild Animals (CMS). Lion range and numbers have declined markedly over the last two decades. In this review we assess the present role of international wildlife treaties with a view to improving their combined contribution to the conservation and sustainable use of lions. Our analysis identifies a substantial body of relevant international wildlife law and, moreover, a significant potential for enhancing the contribution to lion conservation of these global and regional treaties. The time is right to invest in such improvements, and our review renders a range of general and treaty-specific recommendations for doing so, including making full use of the Ramsar Wetlands Convention, World Heritage Convention and transboundary conservation area (TFCA) treaties for lion conservation. The CMS holds particular potential in this regard and our analysis provides strong support for listing the lion in its Appendices.

Global large herbivore conservation and international law

“…While identifying and illustrating the relevance of various legal instruments for large herbivore conservation, no detailed descriptions of the actual legal obligations of contracting parties, institutional structures, general functioning and overall conservation benefits of the various treaty regimes are given below, to avoid undue repetition. A possible starting point when looking for such detail is Trouwborst (2015), discussing most of the instruments mentioned below with respect to large carnivores; other suggested sources are Bowman et al (2010Bowman et al ( , 2016, Gillespie (2011), Trouwborst et al (2017b), and Janssens and Trouwborst (2018).…”

“…Hitherto, such research concerning terrestrial megafauna has predominantly addressed large carnivores and some of the megaherbivores. Species-specific international law analyses regarding large carnivores have focused inter alia on lions Panthera leo (Watts 2016;Trouwborst et al 2017b;Bauer et al 2018;Hodgetts et al 2018), cheetahs Acinonyx jubatus (Nowell and Rosen 2018), leopards Panthera pardus (Trouwborst et al in press), and ocelots Leopardus pardalis (Kimberley 2017), in addition to an extensive legal literature on gray wolves Canis lupus and other large carnivores in Europe (see, e.g., Epstein 2013;Linnell et al 2017;Trouwborst 2018). The international law literature on large herbivores includes research regarding hippopotamus Hippopotamus amphibius (Snyder 2015), rhinoceroses (Leader-Williams et al 2005;Ayling 2013;Coetzee and Couzens 2017;Janssens and Trouwborst 2018), and especially elephants (Glennon 1990;Kidd and Cowling 2003;Couzens 2014;Nollkaemper 2014;Selier et al 2016;Persaud 2017; Wandesforde-Smith 2016; Jung 2017), with most studies predominantly addressing international trade regulation.…”

Large Carnivores and the Convention on Migratory Species (CMS)—Definitions, Sustainable Use, Added Value, and Other Emerging Issues

“…Notably, the COP has been willing to exclude distinct populations from Appendix I if sustainable taking is possible (Trouwborst et al, 2017). For instance, it recognized this possibility for the Saker falcon, Falco cherrug (CMS COP Resolution 10.28, 2011) and has subsequently promoted the development of an adaptive management framework to improve this species' conservation through, inter alia, regulated sustainable use (CMS COP Resolution 11.18, 2014).…”

Conservation geopolitics

“…Often such cross‐border schemes are promoted or facilitated through the frameworks of global wildlife treaties such as the Convention on Biological Diversity or the Convention on Migratory Species (Trouwborst et al. ).…”