During the IUCN World Conservation Congress in Amman, Queen Noor of Jordan presented the Reuters' media awards. I thought readers would find the winning article from South and East Asia of interest. Submitted by: Shirley McGreal, Chairwoman, International Primate Protection League - e-mail spm@awod.com 

Winner - South & South East Asia

LIVING SPACE: A FEATURE PROGRAM ON ANIMAL PROTECTION

By Lu Hong Jian. Yang Jun

Part One: The Wildlife's Calamity

(Presenter) Hello everyone. Welcome to "Living Space". The Chinese culinary culture is well known all over the world, due to the complex culinary technique and the distinctive culinary art. As a matter of fact, the name of the delicious food is referred as to "Chinese food". People in China may eat a rich variety of things, from delicacies of land and sea to exotic birds and animals, however, which causes the Chinese catering culture sound unpleasant. People are devouring and enjoying delicious food, some of which they are not supposed to eat.

(Caption: the wildlife's calamity)

If you are walking in the street, passing by the restaurants one after another, you are appealed by their specialties. Generally the specialties are made from wild animals, because people has a very strong desire to eat something that they've never eaten, this is kind of fad that people like to pursue. Look, there is an obvious billboard over there! On the left side of it the characters saying" the snake dishes: dragon and chicken soup, dragon and cat soup" are written, and on the right side it says there is "braised wild pork, braised masked palm civet and braised Chinese bamboo rat". Very big characters that mean "specialties of game" are written in the middle. This billboard looks rather aggressive and is even standing up in the downtown area. When the reporter entered into this restaurant, he found out the price for all kinds of snake in the cage was clearly marked on the red pieces of paper and a fog in the cage was getting mad. I sadly realize the fog is unable to escape from people's mouths in spite of it being very cunning. Anyway there supplied a rich variety of the game from air, land or sea with different cuisine, such as pan- frying' stir-frying, deep-frying, stewing and whatever. It seems people do their best to fight with the animal, why?

(Presenter) The wild animal takes an important part of the nature, and is a friend of human beings. However, do you know how many wild animals have been killed by people? During Chinese spring festival, which is the season when people are required to add nutrition in Chinese thinking, in order to strike out against excessively killing and hunting the wildlife, we, the reporters of the program Living Space start to investigate the circumstance concerning the wildlife in the key cities of Guangxi province. Here is our report:

Captions: Liu Zhou Jiahe Market

When we walked around Liuzhou JianHe market, we saw many cages with wild animals. It is said this is the distributing center of the wildlife in a large scale.

------(Stall-keeper): It is absolutely wild-bred. If not, free get. I dare say.

------(Journalist): How are you going to have it ?

------(Stall-keeper): Well, Long Hu Feng meal is the best. That means a snake, a cat and a pheasant.

------(Journalist) Oh, that is the meaning of Long Hu Feng meal, I see.

------(Journalist): What is this?

------It is a small Indian civet. It is rather cheap, only 30 yuan.

In another stall we found ac, a kind of wild cat. It belongs to the provincial protected animal. It is very fierce in nature and quick in its movement. Look. A trap breaks its front feet.

------(Journalist): Where did you Bet it ?

------(Stall-keeper): In the mountains. It was caught by a villager's trap. Its meat is very tasty.

This leopard cat was free yesterday, but today he is facing death. Even so, the leopard is struggling to bite the iron cage because he can't understand why he has to suffer. Another deer-like animal names Indian muntjac, its leg being damaged by the hunters, is waiting for being killed by people.

In this shop, the business is really good, and the buyers purchase the wild animals in cash. On the top of the picture are showing a rich variety of the wildlife that is being sold, as well as a plot that the seller is taking the gallbladder from a snake which will sell five RMB each one, then put the gallbladder into a glass of wine.

On the right underside of the picture is showing a cape barn owl, and another cape barn owl is being pulled its feather by the seller, while a couple of people are roasting a leopard cat nearby. Look, the cat doesn't look as beautiful as it did just then. It was butchered dead. The Stall-keeper told us that he was going to have the cat baked. When it is ready the meat is crisp and brown-yellow. It not only looks good but is delicious as well.

The blue fire is dancing and singing happily in the stove as if it asked them to be quick. In their eyes such kind of cat is something that makes money for them. The business is good because everyone here is very busy attending to clients, bargaining or weighing animals. The lady is laying a leopard cat on the table. She expects to get a good price.

A dealer purchased this Naja naja from a villager in the rural. The price is rising up sharply because of wintertime and snake sleeping. The dealer holds up high the snake and hopes we will buy it.

The woman steps to us with an owl in her hand. At present owls are becoming less and less and thus more and more difficult to catch. Today she had got two and sold one just then. She would like to give us a bargain if we want to buy it. Then she told us the method of capture.

------How did you catch it?

------By tuna oil.

Pangolin is a State-level 2 protected animal. In a dark stall with dim light a labour-girl is tearing hard out the nails from a killed pangolin with pliers. The pangolin has no front legs. Perhaps they were destroyed by gunfire.

As we found the illegal management was so serious that we decided to inform the Liu Zhou Forestry Bureau. When the forestry police turned up a few minutes later the stall-keeper broke up in a hubbub and the whole market was in a terrible mess. The dealer who tried to sell us the snake was too frightened to do anything. The rear man in the picture seems to be calm as if nothing had happened because he had hidden his animals. Unfortunately, one stall-keeper that was not fast enough to have his things hidden saw his animals being confiscated by the police. The man lying behind the stall noticed the process and hurried to the stall where a pangolin is being butchered. The people in the stall got the things carried and closed the door immediately so as to escape examination. However, no sooner they closed the door than the police arrived. The boss the stall was reluctant to answer the door when she heard the police. It turned out that a northern goshawk belonging to the Stall-level 2 protected animal was found in the fridge and thus the boss was punished later.

The labour-girl that butchered pangolin that day is now butchering snakes. She is so skillful and calm that we are wondering what she will butcher tomorrow.

------Have you sold out the pangolin you butchered yesterday?

------No sell. A restaurant took it away.

------How much did they pay you?

------I don't know. It is their pangolin and I just helped butchered it only.

The police found that most stalls here violated regulations or overtook management range in operation. Therefore they penalized those stalls and confiscated their stock animals. All that have been done heavily cracks down the illegal management of wildlife.

(Presenter) It has been more than ten years since [the law for wildlife conservation] was carried out into practice. However, people continue to kill and eat the wildlife even more seriously. Why people keep destroying the sources of the wildlife violently on the time when our life is getting more and more abundant and developed?

People often consider the rare things as the valuable ones. The rare species are listed on the range of the wildlife conservation, which, therefore, stimulates someone's appetite, because people involving illegal and selling the wildlife are able to make fortunes. Cuora trifasciapa, is becoming rare through all Guangxi province, its price thus reaches 4000RMB per 500 gram, estimated more than l0,000RMB each one in the black market. The profit of the business concerning the wildlife is extremely high. This is the reason why people offend against the law at the risk.

Zhang Maoqun, born in Longzhou County and 37 years old, broke into Longgang Nature Reserve to go hunting in 1998. He killed two Francois' leaf monkeys. They were worth 125,000 yuan

------ (Zhang Maoqun) I found nothing to hunt that day. I was about to leave when I saw a group of monkeys in the distance. I didn't recognized Francois' leaf monkey. I fired five shoots and killed two of them. At that moment I was nervous to feel that two was more than I wanted. Then I decided to sell one and got 405 yuan.

That is the case of two valuable Francois' leaf monkey being killed by the people blinded by greed. Francois' leaf monkey is a kind of State-level 1 protected animal. It is distributed in Guangxi and Guizhou Provinces. The People Court of Longzhou County tried this case by law and sentenced Zhang Maoqun five years in prison and penalized him 4000 yuan.

------(Zhang Maoqun) I made a big wrong. I should be condemned myself and be punished by law. From now on I will do my duty to help protect Francois' leaf monkey.

Wu Kangshou, from Guangdong and 36 years old, should have been at home to take care his old mother and his family. Unfortunately, a fortune dream made him a prisoner in Guangxi a year ago.

----(Wu Kangshou) I didn't know I would break laws when I purchased python molurus in Pangxiang. When I was on the way carrying the snakes home 2 km away from Pangxiang I was arrested by the police on Jan. 3rd, 1999.

Wu Kangshou illegally purchased 128 python moluruses of the State-level protected animal. They weighed about one ton and were worth some 1.4 million yuan. This is an exceptionally serious event.

------(Wed Jiayun, Judge) According to Clause 341 of " Criminal Law of the People's Republic of China" we sentenced Wu Kangshou 10 years and penalized him 50,000 yuan for his accusation of illegal purchase and delivery of rare and endangered animals. This case gives us a warning that talking is not enough to protect wildlife. We have to take actions. In fact the measures to crack down illegal management of wildlife has been greatly strengthened since the criminal law was revised in 1997.

This tragedy gave Wu Kang Shou a severe lesson: as he deprived the wildlife of the right of freedom and existence, he himself lost freedom as well.

(Presenter) The earth is the garden lived by people and the animal together, so people and the animal are supposed to reconcile. But unfortunately, human beings are being the most dangerous enemy of the animal due to people's greed. At the end of this program, we would like to collect a few pictures regarding the extinct animals and the almost extinct animals on show, which is giving people a warning. thanks for watching. good-bye.

Part two: Be Friendly With Them 

(Presenter) Hello everyone. Welcome to "Living Space". A long time ago, as remote as the dinosaur era, only a species of animal was extinct every thousand years in average. And before 20th century the extinct speed came to one species within about four years. Nowadays, however, species reduction of plant or animal daily occurs. How shocking the situation is! If you take care well enough you will see how some species disappeared forever from earth through our meals. The snake is the loser of this event. A snake, which makes most people bloodcurdling when they are talking about it, is regarded as a symbol of cunning and viciousness. However, what is strange is that the consumption of snake meat was the biggest of all wildlife consumption.

(Caption: be friendly with them)

This is a snake meal restaurant in Nanning. It shows no shop sign because it was hurriedly taken down a few days ago in order to lie low in the trend of uncovering illegal management of wildlife in Nanning. Even so, the boss of the restaurant never misses any chances of making money at this moment.

------(Journalist): Where did you get that snake?

------(Boss): From Vietnam through Pangxiang. This c weighs about 1.7 jin.

------How much is it per jin?

------100 yuan.

------It is too dear.

------What else snakes do you have?

------Only two kinds of snakes today. Normally we have much more. They are ptyas mucosus, Ptyas korros, Elaphe radiapa, Ophiophagus hannah. Anyway as much as you want.

In generally a snake never bites people in winter. Look at this Naja naja. He seems to know that someone is going to bite him. He is angry, but he fails to free from the fate of being killed First his head will be cut down and put into the boiling water. His skin will be tore from the body when he is still a little conscious. Then the chest will be cut open to take out the gallbladder and sliced. It will take less than five minutes to do that from the beginning to the end.

Nobody knows when the custom of eating snake meat began in our country. But it can be said that the custom has begun in south of Five Ridges since Tang and Song Dynasty. Snake meat is regarded as a delicious dish replenishing kidney and nourishing blood and the vital essence and dispelling rheumatic pains. Look, the Naja naja is raising his head up to greet clients in the cold wind. He should have had a winter sleep at this season but he has to devote himself to be a meal at the table. This is a restaurant in Guilin, where a big shop sign saying " Snake's Offer" can be in sight impressively. People can't help imagining that human is the king of the nature and all things on the earth had to be his subjects. In people's opinion the whole snake is a health care treasure to them. It can be cooked into soup and braised and can be made into wine, even used as medicine. The contribution that the snake makes to the human is so great that Liu Zongyuan, the writer of Tang Dynasty didn't absolutely expect such a fate a snake suffers from today in his "Saying of snake Catcher".

Though snake breeding has been developed in recent years in order to meet the market demand, the reduction of wild snake number has been continuing.

Dr. Huang Chengming (ecologist): At present there are some snake breeding farms. But from the techniques and breeding conditions of view artificial breeding of snake is not successful at most. Therefore, these snake farms usually purchase snakes when snake supply overdoes because the lower prices in the season. And they sell the snakes when supply is in shortage because the price gets much higher. Such are the snake breeding farms that they are the snake supply bases other than snake breeding farms one hundred per cent sure. Hence we can say most snakes in the market are from the fields.

The snake catchers have no idea of the day when they found it harder and harder to look for a snake and thus catching more and more difficult.

------(Journalist): Is it easy to catch a snake?

------(Snake catcher): Of course not. More people and less snakes.

------(Lady boss): Snakes are becoming less and less year by year.

------(journalist): why?

------Capture is carried out all year round. Who can't supply so much?

According to the statistics the trade volume of snake was more than one thousand tons annually in 1990's. And the volume is up year by year. What will happen to the nature in the case of the dramatic reduction of the wild snake number in the field? A great many people who are concerned with the balance of nature are very worried about that.

This is Songjiang Village, Daizhen Township, Lingchuan County. It is located in the high mountain 1000 meters above sea level, 47 km away from Guilin in the east. It is a Yao Nationality village where the residents are not so rich. Last year a convention was concluded in the village, stipulating that every household has to feed at least a cat. What is it for?

------Qing Fuwei (villager) In the past the food capita was 300 jin in our village. The rat harm caused damage to grain, however, was 10 % each year i.e each dweller lost 20- 30 kg in the past few years. Since then a measure that each household at least fed a cat has been taken in our village so as to kill rats and reduce loss of grain.

------(Woman villager) This field is ours. It is close to the hills. The rats destroyed the crops so we harvested nothing last year.

------(Man villager) There exist lots of rats in the hills. They attacked our mushroom trees and damaged the barks of trees and thus killed the trees and mushrooms couldn't grow any more in the end.

Rats frequently destroyed the mushrooms the residents grew on the hill in winter. Why is this so rampant? It turns out to be that this area is of remote thickly forested mountains rich in wildlife and becomes a supply base of mountain products. All the year many merchants come here to buy the products with very low prices and sell them with higher prices in Guilin. Therefore it brings about heavy hunting and killing of snakes and owls that are the natural enemy of the rats.

------(Qing Fuwei, villager) Every village has people to catch snakes. Furthermore urban residents also come and catch snakes.

------(Journalist) Why do so many people want to catch snakes?

------(Qing Fuwei, villager) Because people like eating snakes and a great demand of snakes is available. Snakes can make some people rich due to the high profit. For example, a cobra, 100 yuan per jin, can earn 400-500 yuan. That is the reason that many people want to catch snakes.

The honest residents told us that in order to kill rats they had tried many methods including using poison chemicals, which prove to be helpless. In the end they tried feeding cats.

------(Professor Huang) Feeding cats, in a certain extent, can solve the home rat harm problem. But to the field rats cats can do nothing more. The key to handle this problem is to protect the rat's natural enemy, such as snakes and owls. When the number of snake and owl is big enough rat harm will be under control naturally.

------(Zhou Fang, professor in zoology): Every species of wildlife has their own position in the food chain of the nature. If a link is broken it will cause the destruction of the whole chain. That the rat harm at the moment is so serious is due to snake rapid reduction. According to the statistics the number of rat in the whole country is so big that the possession of per capita is four rats. In Guangxi the figure is even bigger, about 20 to 30. So serious is the rat harm today in Guangxi that nobody are in doubt there is a great deal to do with the heavy reduction of the snakes, owls and wild cats that are natural enemy of rats.

(Presenter) The nature loses balance and rat harm is on a rampage, which leads to dramatic reduction of grain production. According to the statistic data if an owl is killed the rat quantity will be increased by 1000 and two tons of grain will be lost per year. The quantity of grain eaten by the rats yearly is equal to the total imports. Besides snakes turtles are largely hunted and killed in Guangxi and they are disappearing from the nature. According to the census sparrows have become extinct in some 60 counties of the region. The experts have foreseen that such animals as Cuora trifasciapa Nycticebus coucang, White-ear Night Heron, Varanus salvator and the like will also be extinct from the region in the near 30 years unless the measures to protect them are taken. More and more animals are making their farewell to us. And the biosphere of the earth is confronted with critical crisis. A writer said the situation of the wildlife today is the tomorrow of the human being. We hope his deeply felt saying could remind people to think deeply about it.

(Presenter) In the era of Wu Song's fighting tiger, many beasts of prey were the objects to kill for the purposes of self-defense of the human being. Later people conquered the beast of prey and began to deal with flies, mosquitoes, rats and sparrows. Then as the modern science and technology develops, none of the animals are able to create a menace to human being. On the contrary, people can do as they please. They can enjoy trying anything game. However, whenever people conquered it the nature would retaliate or punish them later. What should the human do with the wildlife?

In a textbook a fox is described as a symbol of the cunning and a snake as viciousness. But have people ever thought what they are in the eyes of animals? Nowadays people have begun self- examination with the exposition of ecological crisis day after day. In the 20th century people endeavored for worldwide race equality and sex equality then it is urgent for them to solve the generation equality and species equality in the 21st century. The generation equality means that the present people have no right to deprive the young generations of space for living or to damage it. The slogans put forth of "Preserve wildlife " and "Enjoy the nature under the blue sky" indicate that so far people have begun to be modest and unassuming. They are pursuing the harmonious existence with the nature.

A proposal meeting of 100 thousand populations was held in Nanning on 15th, Jan. A proposal of From the Meal to protect wildlife was put forth and it was responded extensively. Tens of restaurants made a joint statement to decline the wildlife unknowingly originated. A similar meeting was also held in Guilin.

------(Zhang Mujie, vice chairman of Guangxi NPC Standing Committee): To protect wildlife it is essential to control well people's mouths and to boycott game meal. In this way the illegal purchase and management of wildlife will be under control. The Spring Festival is coming. It is a very important link to give up the habit of eating game that is regarded as a traditional enjoyment.

------(Citizen) We should not kill wildlife for meal because wildlife is a part of biological chain of the nature. No matter which one is missing the whole chain will not be well functioned and thus will result in unbalance of nature.

------(Citizen) Wildlife is our friends. We should cherish them instead of killing them. Otherwise our new generations won't see them any more.

This is a drawing show on human and animals. Children extend their imagination discursively. They describe what they can see of the world in their eyes. The soul or heart of a child is pure and honest. Besides it is also sensitive. The world in the souls should have been nice and lovely. Children can often honestly find out with their pure and honest souls what the adults get used to unfeelingly.

------(Child) I drew a monkey and ho is very frightened because someone wants to catch hunt He has many pals at the beginning. But they have been driven away by people. He is alone and lonely. He wants to go back to the forests for freedom.

Children love animals and treat them as friends and good mates. However the critical facts have hurt their hearts and feelings. They want to draw that present world and the ideal one in their dreams so as to arouse all people.

The living space of wildlife is reduced because of wanton destruction of wildlife by human and serious damages to the environment.

------Animals should live in forests, pastures and somewhere else as they please. Only in the" places can they live safe and happy.

------Animals are in fact our friends. We can't treat them as a kind of food because they are also a living soul on the earth.

The soul or heart of a child is a mirror. Not only can it reflect the true, the good and the beautiful, but also the ugly and the evil in the world. We hope the world in future will be a lovely garden instead of the heaven in which children are disappointed.

(Presenter) Since the life appeared 3 billion years ago 2.5 billion species of plants and animals had been created and of millions of species is human being. Like other living things the human being is a role of the biosphere. Unless are we aware of the role we play in the biosphere we will never be able to learn how to do with the wildlife that shares the earth with us. China is a member state of the convention on protection of wildlife. Let's preserve wildlife hand in hand. Cherish our homeland. Thanks for watching. Good-bye.