Eat or be eaten: Tigers are on the wrong side of jungle law in Malaysia, conservationists say

August 23, 2002

Fri Aug 23, 5:53 AM ET

By ROHAN SULLIVAN, Associated Press Writer

KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia - Despite a recent spate of tiger attacks on humans, conservationists in Malaysia say the protected big cats are increasingly on the losing side of one of the fundamental laws of the jungle: eat or be eaten.

"It is far more likely that a person will eat a tiger in this country than the other way around," Mikaail Kavanagh Abdullah, chief of Malaysia's World Wildlife Fund, said Friday.

Although tigers are among Malaysia's most endangered animals and are shielded from hunting by law, their meat is turning up alongside other wildlife as fare in restaurants across the country, Abdullah said in a statement.

"Animals on offer include leopards, monkeys, bears and fruit bats," he said. "Tigers are a rarity on most menus, but they too end up in the cooking pot."

Although big cats and other endangered animals are protected, choice pieces of wild animals — from whale blubber to bear paws — are prized in many parts of Asia as traditional remedies, aphrodisiacs and delicacies.

Trying to capitalize on a high-profile debate on how to deal with tigers following the recent attacks, the fund is urging Malaysians to boycott restaurants serving wildlife meat, which is often collected illegally.

The fund also urged the government to pass laws making it illegal to sell any products that claim to contain parts of animals that are endangered, as recommended in the Convention on International Trade on Endangered Species.

Traditional Chinese remedies are often advertised as having products from rare animals, said Dionysius Sharma, the WWF's head of species conservation. Many of the claims are probably false, but may add to their popularity.

"We are not against traditional Chinese medicine," Dr. Sharma said. "We are only worried that such practices may push certain species, like the tiger, to extinction."

Three people have been killed by tigers since May in Malaysia, and at least five other attacks have been reported this year.

The three deadly maulings occurred in a single district in rural northeast Kelantan state, when tigers crept out of jungles that bordered rubber and oil palm plantations and attacked workers.

Claiming villagers were too scared to go to work in the plantations, Kelantan Chief Minister Nik Aziz Nik Mat said last week that Malaysia had too many tigers and that he would ask the army to shoot all of the animals in his state.

The plan outraged conservationists, who said tigers only attacked humans because their natural habitat is being destroyed. State wildlife officials also criticized his remarks, and the army took no action.

Once relatively common in Malaysia, the tiger population has dwindled to an estimated 500 as their forest habitats shrink due to the spread of farming and residential developments. Increasingly, tigers and other wild animals are forced to look for food in areas where people live or work.

Killing tigers is illegal in Malaysia, unless the animal is deemed responsible for attacking a person. In areas where tigers are spotted, traps are laid and captured animals are taken to zoos.

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