According to Chinese authorities, the coronavirus spread to humans from wildlife at a wildlife market in Wuhan. Most likely, Ebola and AIDS also originated from wildlife. Besides the serious threats to biodiversity and sustainable development, the risk for human health is thus an additional reason to strengthen the efforts to combat wildlife trafficking and other forms of wildlife crime. Over the last years, Ecologic Institute has published several studies on environmental compliance and crime related to wildlife crime. The most comprehensive study on wildlife crime was presented to the Committee on the Environment, Public Health and Food Safety (ENVI) of the European Parliament in Brussels in April 2016.

The Ecologic Institute, together with a consortium, conducted a study on wildlife crime, which gives an overview over the state of wildlife crime in Europe. As as a basis for this study, in-depth analyses were carried out for five EU member states. Ecologic Institute conducted the in-depth analysis of wildlife crime in Germany. The analysis concludes that Germany is not a main destination for illegal wildlife products from iconic species, but still an important destination for live animals like reptiles for the pet market. It is also an important transit country for ivory and other illegally traded animal parts from Western and Central Africa with East and South-East Asia as the main region of destination. The studies were compiled on behalf of the European Parliament and are available for download.

Wildlife crime is no longer an emerging issue, but has established itself as a serious threat to biodiversity and sustainable development. In the period between 2010 and 2012 alone, for example, 100,000 elephants were killed in Africa for ivory. The EU is both one of the most important markets for illegal wildlife products and an important actor in the fight against wildlife crime. As such, Ecologic Institute coordinated a study on wildlife crime which was commissioned by the European Parliament. Further project partners were the Institute for European Environmental Policy (IEEP), the Institute for Environmental Studies (IVM), the University of South Wales (Jennifer Maher), Ragnild Sollund from the University of Oslo, Teresa Fajardo del Castillo from the University of Granada and Tanya Wyatt from Northumbria University.