Poaching, trafficking crackdowns boost bird counts

China's wintering waterbird population peaked at about 6.3 million this year, up nearly 159 percent from 2016, officials said on Thursday, attributing the surge to six consecutive years of multi-agency crackdowns on illegal bird hunting and trafficking activities, culminating in a three-year campaign involving 17 government departments.

The figure is the highest since nationwide monitoring began, Wang Weisheng, director of the flora and fauna department at the National Forestry and Grassland Administration, said at a news conference.

Wang highlighted a series of coordinated enforcement measures introduced since the three-year campaign was launched in 2025.

Public security authorities have carried out cross-regional operations in the Inner Mongolia and Ningxia Hui autonomous regions and across the provinces of Shaanxi, Anhui, Hubei and Guangdong, dismantling poaching and trafficking networks spanning the wildlife crime supply chain and opening 577 criminal investigations, he said.

Market regulators have also strengthened online monitoring and on-site inspections, handling 3,435 suspected illegal wildlife trading alerts since the start of 2025. They have also urged e-commerce platforms to tighten compliance measures and penalize vendors involved in wildlife crimes, Wang said.

Meanwhile, prosecutors have expanded cooperation with forestry and grassland authorities through public interest litigation, filing 1,106 criminal indictments and initiating 1,653 public-interest lawsuits, he added.

According to Wang, the coordinated campaign has produced tangible results, with populations of many endangered bird species rebounding alongside the sharp increase in the country's wintering waterbird population.

The population of Baer's pochard, for instance, has more than doubled to 2,555 birds since 2012, based on the result of a nationwide winter survey completed last year, he said.

The population of the blue-crowned laughingthrush has also increased, rising from 550 in 2024 to about 660, he added.

Han Yanjun, an official with the Ministry of Public Security, said public security authorities nationwide handled 3,562 bird-related criminal cases in 2025, an increase of 84.8 percent year-on-year.

"The ministry doubled down on major cases, fully leveraging the enforcement momentum generated through direct supervisory oversight to achieve broader results nationwide," Han said.

Through the direct supervision of 15 major cases, the ministry uncovered 253 related offenses, apprehended 571 suspects and dismantled 114 criminal organizations, he added.

houliqiang@chinadaily.com.cn