BBC Radio 4 charity appeal for tigers – a personal message from a familiar face!
Press play, below, to hear a special message from Angela Rippon on behalf of our Tiger Campaign (c) EIAimage
As we celebrate our 35th anniversary year, we’re very pleased to have been chosen for a BBC Radio 4 charity appeal!
We are also delighted to have secured veteran journalist and broadcaster Angela Rippon to present it for us later this month.
Captive tiger held at a resort complex in Laos (c) EIAimage
You’ll be able to listen to the appeal, on behalf of our Tiger Campaign, on BBC Radio 4:
- Sunday, 23 February at 7:54am and 9:25pm
- Thursday, 27 February at 3.27pm
Wild tigers are in big trouble
Tigers are in big trouble, one of the most high-profile victims of international illegal wildlife trade.
Only about 4,000 tigers remain in the wild due to poaching and habitat loss. Many thousands more are held captive in tiger farms to feed rising consumer demand for their skins, teeth, claws and meat.
As a result, wild tigers are practically extinct in Cambodia, Laos and Vietnam and are close to disappearing in China.
‘Tiger wine’
Shockingly, criminals even profit from the dead tiger cubs born in commercial captivity, using them to make ‘tiger wine’.
Our undercover investigators have witnessed the carcasses of tiger cubs soaking in wine vats alongside ingredients such as snakes, scorpions and bear paws.
Tiger farms are the biggest threat
A tiger roams free
China is the world’s leading destination for tiger body parts and has a massive tiger farming industry, with up to 6,000 kept captive for their ultimate use as skins for luxury home décor or as ingredients in traditional Chinese medicine.
Another 2,000 tigers are captive in Laos, Thailand and Vietnam. In Vietnam, adult tigers and cubs are bred in cages in the backyards of ordinary houses – and sold by the kilo.
A donation would help give tigers and other gravely threatened species a fighting chance at a future, enabling us to continue our work exposing environmental crime.
