{"id":33873,"date":"2022-12-07T07:36:20","date_gmt":"2022-12-07T02:06:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/?p=33873"},"modified":"2025-04-20T02:25:05","modified_gmt":"2025-04-19T20:55:05","slug":"wild-life-protection-amendment-2022","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wild-life-protection-amendment-2022\/","title":{"rendered":"Wild Life (Protection) Amendment, 2022"},"content":{"rendered":"<h3><strong>What\u2019s in today\u2019s article?<\/strong><\/h3>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Why in News?<\/strong><\/li>\n<li><strong>About Wild Life (Protection) Amendment, 2022 (Key Features of the Bill)<\/strong><\/li>\n<li><strong>About CITES (Purpose, Features, etc.)<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h2><strong>Why in News?<\/strong><\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li>Environment and Forest Minister Bhupender Yadav introduced in the Rajya Sabha a Bill to amend the <strong>Wild Life (Protection) Act, 1972<\/strong> to strengthen protection for endangered species and enhance punishment for illegal trade in wildlife.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h2><strong>About Wild Life (Protection) Amendment, 2022:<\/strong><\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li>The Wild Life (Protection) Amendment Bill, 2022 was introduced in Lok Sabha by the Minister of Environment, Forest and Climate Change in December, 2021.\n<ul>\n<li>The Bill was passed by the Lok Sabha in August, 2022.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li>The Bill amends the <strong>Wild Life (Protection) Act, 1972<\/strong>.\n<ul>\n<li>The Act regulates the protection of wild animals, birds and plants.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li>The Bill seeks to increase the species protected under the law, and implement the <strong>Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora<\/strong> (CITES).<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h2><strong>Key Features of the Bill include:<\/strong><\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>CITES \u2013<\/strong>\n<ul>\n<li>CITES is an international agreement between governments to ensure that international trade in specimens of wild animals and plants does not threaten the survival of the species.<\/li>\n<li>The <strong>Bill seeks to implement provisions of CITES<\/strong>.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li><strong>Rationalizing schedules \u2013<\/strong>\n<ul>\n<li><u>Currently, the Act has six schedules<\/u> for specially protected plants (one), specially protected animals (four), and vermin species (one).<\/li>\n<li>The <u>Bill reduces the total number of schedules to four<\/u> by \u2013\n<ul>\n<li>Reducing the number of schedules for specially protected animals to two (one for greater protection level),<\/li>\n<li>Removes the schedule for vermin species, and<\/li>\n<li>Inserts a new schedule for specimens listed in the Appendices under CITES.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li><strong>Obligations under CITES \u2013<\/strong>\n<ul>\n<li>The Bill provides for the central government to designate Management Authority and Scientific Authority.<\/li>\n<li>As per CITES, the Management Authority may use an identification mark for a specimen.<\/li>\n<li>The <strong>Bill prohibits any person from modifying or removing the identification mark of the specimen<\/strong>.<\/li>\n<li>Additionally, every person possessing live specimens of scheduled animals must obtain a registration certificate from the Management Authority.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li><strong>Invasive alien species \u2013<\/strong>\n<ul>\n<li>Invasive alien species refers to <strong>plant or animal species which are not native to India<\/strong> and whose introduction may adversely impact wild life or its habitat.<\/li>\n<li>The Bill empowers the central government to regulate or prohibit the import, trade, possession or proliferation of invasive alien species.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li><strong>Control of sanctuaries \u2013<\/strong>\n<ul>\n<li>The Act entrusts the Chief Wild Life Warden to control, manage and maintain all sanctuaries in a state.<\/li>\n<li>The Chief Wild Life Warden is appointed by the state government.<\/li>\n<li>The Bill specifies that <strong>actions of the Chief Warden must be in accordance with the management plans for the sanctuary<\/strong>.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li><strong>Conservation reserves \u2013<\/strong>\n<ul>\n<li>Under the Act, state governments may declare areas adjacent to national parks and sanctuaries as a conservation reserve, for protecting flora and fauna, and their habitat.<\/li>\n<li>The <strong>Bill empowers the central government to also notify a conservation reserve<\/strong>.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li><strong>Surrender of captive animals \u2013<\/strong>\n<ul>\n<li>The <strong>Bill provides for any person to voluntarily surrender any captive animals or animal products to the Chief Wild Life Warden<\/strong>.<\/li>\n<li>No compensation will be paid to the person for surrendering such items.<\/li>\n<li>The surrendered items become property of the state government.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h2><strong>About CITES:<\/strong><\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li>CITES, which stands for the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora, is a <u>global agreement among governments to regulate or ban international trade in species under threat<\/u>.<\/li>\n<li>In the mid-20th century, governments were beginning to recognize that <u>trade in some wild animals and plants had a devastating impact on those species<\/u>.<\/li>\n<li>These species were being driven toward extinction through unsustainable use for food, fuel, medicine, and other purposes.<\/li>\n<li>And while individual governments could control what happened within their borders, they did not have a way to address the impacts of international trade in these species.<\/li>\n<li>In <strong>1973<\/strong>, <u>21 countries addressed this issue by signing the CITES agreement<\/u>.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h2><strong>About the Agreement:<\/strong><\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li>CITES remains one of the cornerstones of international conservation.<\/li>\n<li>There are <strong>184 member Parties<\/strong> and trade is regulated in more than <strong>38,000 species<\/strong>.<\/li>\n<li>Representatives of <u>CITES nations meet every two to three years at a Conference of the Parties (or COP)<\/u> to review progress and adjust the lists of protected species.<\/li>\n<li>The <strong>protected species are grouped into three categories<\/strong> with different levels of protection \u2013\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Appendix I \u2013<\/strong>\n<ul>\n<li>Includes the <u>world&#8217;s most endangered plants and animals<\/u>, such as tigers and gorillas.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li><strong>Appendix II \u2013<\/strong>\n<ul>\n<li>Contains species like <u>corals that are not yet threatened with extinction, but which could become threatened if unlimited trade were allowed<\/u>.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li><strong>Appendix III \u2013<\/strong>\n<ul>\n<li><u>Species whose trade is only regulated within a specific country can be placed on Appendix III<\/u> if that country requires cooperation from other nations to help prevent exploitation.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<hr \/>\n<h3><strong>Q1) What are endangered species?<\/strong><\/h3>\n<p>An endangered species is a type of organism that is threatened by extinction. Species become endangered for two main reasons: loss of habitat and loss of genetic variation.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h3><strong>Q2) What are invasive species?<\/strong><\/h3>\n<p>Invasive alien species (IAS) are species whose introduction and\/or spread outside their natural past or present distribution threatens biological diversity.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<hr \/>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Wildlife protection amendment Bill aims to strengthen protection for endangered species.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":33874,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-33873","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-upsc-mains-current-affairs","8":"no-featured-image-padding"},"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33873","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=33873"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33873\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/33874"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=33873"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=33873"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=33873"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}