Data Science Project for Global Wildlife Trafficking
Project carrier :
Ani Madurkar ,Raya Abourjeily, Alex Hardy
Beneficiaries:
Endangered animal species
All endangered animal protection researchers
Users:
All endangered animal protection researchers
Need:
Data needs from researchers primarily revolved around:
Domain specialists may use broad data analysis that is easily accessible to help them ask the correct questions.
A huge proportion of big data analysis that produce understandable and actionable outcomes.
Principle :
Giving future scholars and practitioners easy access to advanced analytics at scale can help them ask better questions and use evidence to investigate illicit activities. It can motivate them to openly share and use data, which has enormous potential for transforming current solutions from reactionary to prescriptive.
Link:
https://public.tableau.com/app/profile/raya.abourjeily/viz/LEMIS/Overview
CITES TRADE DATA DASHBOARD
Project carrier :
The CITES Trade Database was developed and is maintained by UNEP-WCMC on behalf of the CITES Secretariat
Beneficiaries:
Endangered animal species
World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF)
All endangered animal protection researchers
Users:
CITES has cooperation with listed organisations:
The Biodiversity Liaison Group and other Multilateral Environmental Agreements
The International Consortium on Combating Wildlife Crime
The United Nations Environment Management Group
Need:
This project is answering the needs to:
Cooperation on increaing biodiversity The CITES Secretariat collaborates with the Secretariat of the Basel Convention and with the Ozone Secretariat (see MoU here), with the Intergovernmental Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) and the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN).
Coorperation on combating wildlife trade The CITES aims at bring coordinated support to the national wildlife law enforcement agencies and to the sub-regional and regional networks that, on a daily basis, act in defence of natural resources.
Coorperation on protecting the environment It identifies issues on the agenda that warrant joint efforts, and finds ways of engaging its collective capacity in coherent management responses to those issues.
Principle :
The CITES Trade Data Dashboards provide a new, interactive, and dynamic view of the trade data submitted by CITES Parties in their annual reports to the Convention. The Global dashboard shows global trade trends, whereas the National dashboard displays data by country.
Main technologies involved:to be done
Links:
https://dashboards.cites.org
Interactive wildlife seizure dashboard
Project carrier :
The USAID Reducing Opportunities for Unlawful Transport of Endangered Species (ROUTES)
Beneficiaries:
Endangered animal species
Transportation personnel who need to improve the ability of transportation personnel to assist law enforcement to combat wildlife trafficking
World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF)
Users:
U.S. Government
The Center for Advanced Defense Studies (C4ADS)
TRAFFIC
International Air Transport Association (IATA)
World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF)
Need:
Enhance wildlife trafficking data and analytics for evidence-based action
Principle :
It generated data to facilitate monitoring and assessment as part of the change indicators throughout time, as well as to assist industry leaders in understanding risks and opportunities.
Links:
http://www.routesdashboard.org/
(AI) model – Project SEEKER
Project carrier :
Microsoft
Beneficiaries:
Endangered animal species
UK security firm Smiths Detection
UK Border Force CITES team
Users:
Heathrow Airport
The Center for Advanced Defense Studies (C4ADS)
TRAFFIC
Need:
Enhance wildlife trafficking data and analytics for evidence-based action
Principle :
Project SEEKER helps address the $23 billion illegal wildlife trafficking industry, by scanning luggage and cargo at borders and alerting agencies of trafficked goods.
Links:
https://www.seeker.com/series/wild-crime
Interactive wildlife seizure dashboard
Carriers and actors of the project
ROUTES is a core group of partners collaborating with the U.S. Government and the transport sector that includes Airports Council International (ACI), the Center for Advanced Defense Studies (C4ADS), the International Air Transport Association (IATA), TRAFFIC and WWF. The Partnership is funded by USAID and coordinated by TRAFFIC.
Airports and airlines across the world are actors who denounce the illegal wildlife trade and voice that they are on their guard against smuggling attempts.
Research question
Which flight paths are most frequently used by wildlife criminals?
Which ports should we focus our efforts on?
What kinds of animals are commonly transported in these sensitive flight paths?
Why choose this project
Empowering professionals in need to further existing joint efforts:
ROUTES empowers personnel with the necessary tools and information to be a part of the solution by providing targeted data analytics, increasing communication and information sharing between the private sector and enforcement, and ultimately embedding wildlife trafficking solutions within existing company policies.
Brings large impact with a wide coverage of cooperated organisations :
ROUTES brings together transportation and logistics corporations, government agencies, development organizations, law enforcement, and conservation organizations to disrupt wildlife trafficking via legal transportation supply chains.
Brings concrete impact by focusing on one key domain : transport sector of animals
ROUTE's dashboard provides ideal training material and tools for role-specific training in the aviation sector, aiming to alleviate the scenario in which many actors throughout supply chains may deliberately or inadvertently enable the illegal transportation of wildlife.
Persona
First name: Alex
Age : 34
Activity / Profession :Authorisations and standards manager at Kenya Airport Authority
Place of residence, country, environment (city, countryside, etc : Residence in Kenyawar
Family status : MarriedIncome : 1000 $ per month
Income : 2000 $ per month
List of needs, desires, dreams : training staffs in cargo, ground, in-flight crews and operation on detecting wildlife trading in order to avoid wildlife trading affects the regions, businesses, and supply chains
List of problems and frustrations : traffickers tend to change their routes constantly to avoid detection, making any region and any airport size potentially vulnerable .Illicit trade exposes air transport industry’s reputation within the Global Value Chain.
Major issue related to the subject : Urgent need of risk guidance reference to warn different roles across the air transport sector in time.
Key features
Customs officers use their judgement based on the location, they assess the risks and conduct random checks. The profile certain passengers based on flight routes, behaviour or demographic to track down such cases.
Know updated wildlife transportation route
Verify most common wildlife species and its transportation amount trend in their region
Check new wildlife trafficker hotspots in their region
UX storyboard
Technical overview from API perspective
The Dashboard’s graphics are derived from open source wildlife seizure data collected by C4ADS under the ROUTES Partnership.
API is triggered by user input and query.Also, filters on region and on animal speices can be applied in the query.
User would receive pre-processed data reports, all the information is sorted,caculated and presented as charts and articles:
for example, the route risk tool allows users to input specific flight routes and receive an estimated risk assessment based on the number of previous trafficking attempts along that route, and Country Profiles, which provides a summary of wildlife trafficking information for individual countries.
Added value thanks to APIs
API give users free access to the record database with simple clicks.It is a lightweight architecture and is good for devices, which have limited bandwidth like smart cell phones.
API also supports the MVC features such as filter, action results, model binders, controllers, routing and IOC container or dependency injection that makes it more robust and simple.