On 6 February 2023, GIFP actions MASIF and SEACOP presented the findings of the joint report “Maritime threat assessment of illicit flows across the Atlantic” online. The report provides insight into illicit flows other than drugs to focus on trafficking of gold, timber waste and E-waste. Researchers from both MASIF and SEACOP painted a vivid picture of the common lack of political will to confront the trafficking of these illicit commodities as well as weak consequences perpetrators face. For example, in 2019, it was estimated that Peru alone was producing between 550-750,000m3 of illicit wood with an estimated market value of USD 452-616 million. This totals to five times the amount of licit wood produced by Peru. In Yacu Kallpa, one of Peru’s high-profile cases related to timber trafficking, 90 individuals were indicted with the highest prison time being 6-11 years for logging concession owners, making this commodity extremely lucrative as well as low risk. Peru is also the biggest exporter of gold in Latin America, estimated at 90 tons in 2021, with around 28% of which is considered illicit. At current gold prices, this illicit gold would be worth USD 1,459 Million.
The webinar was initiated by Deputy Head of Unit at FPI, Jesper Pedersen, who stressed that as about 90% of the world trade happens by sea, any region of the world even landlocked countries, rely on the maritime domain for the transport of goods to satisfy demand and support growing economies. Maritime insecurity therefore stems from drivers of economic activity on land – a land-based problem with maritime symptoms. The size and role of the informal economy ends up in illicit commodities being treated similarly to licit ones – a business opportunity, with high revenues. Because of the business-like nature, criminal actors globally engage in the movement of any lucrative commodity.
He went on to introduce the speakers and authors of the report Dr. Sasha Jesperon, Dr. Rune Henriksen, Dr. Martin Verrier and Paul Henry Lavisse.
The MASIF Team Leader, Marija Atanaskova provided the background and the rationale of the research by highlighting that since 2021 MASIF has worked on expanding the scope of the Global Illicit Flows Programme to focus on non-drug commodities. As narcotics flows across the Atlantic have already been researched thoroughly, more evidence was needed to investigate other commodities, that often use similar routes. MASIF expert Dr, Sasha Jesperson contextualised the threat by highlighting the general modus operandi employed by OCGs when handling these goods: through a “Raise – Move – Use – Store” handling sequence, as well as by demonstrating the current trend in the flows of these illicit goods.
MASIF expert Dr. Rune Henriksen continued by explaining the main distinguishing factors that separate environmental crimes such as illegal mining and logging from more standard illicit commodities like drugs and weapons is the social and economic threats they pose to the source country instead of the recipient country. Additionally, past the transport phase commodities like illicit timber become nearly indistinguishable from their legitimate counterparts. Thus, through corruption, falsified papers, and transhipment, it becomes extremely difficult for law enforcement in recipient countries to differentiate illicit from licit goods. It therefore falls upon authorities in source countries to clamp down corrupt official and minimise access to falsified documents. Dr. Henriksen then provided the attendees with a striking figure: “the illicit rosewood market is worth more than elephant ivory, rhino horn, pangolins, shark fin, and big cat parts combined.”
In the case of waste, production is high, with global production of municipal solid waste estimated to amount to over 2 billion tonnes in 2016. SEACOP expert Paul-Henry Lavisse, elaborated that it is estimated that 25% of all waste shipments are illegal, with a dependence on false shipping statements or waste mixing as a means of legitimising the cargo. While there may be criminal networks involved, the illegal management of waste is considered a white-collar crime because of the intersection with legitimate business. Mr. Lavisse continued by explaining that shippers are primarily targeting Africa due to the lack of political will to tackle the illegal management of waste as well as the near absence of inspectors to categorise and correctly dispose of the waste. Mr. Lavisse then stated that: “in Lagos, Nigeria alone, over 100,000 used PC are dumped each month, generating around 6600 euros per container. He concluded by stating that unfortunately this remains a grey area as many recipient countries depend on the shipment of second-hand E-Waste to recover precious metals and other reusable materials. Hence, perpetrators take advantage of this need and often mix different types of waste in order to resell normal waste as second hand goods.
Dr. Martin Verrier, provided an overview on the current cocaine trends within Latin America as well as a glimpse of the other commodities being trafficked throughout the Atlantic. Cocaine trafficking to Europe remains an attractive enterprise for OCGs rather than the US as the street value in Europe is higher than in the United States, USD 42000 in Europe vs USD 29000 in the US. Concerning the latter, these other commodities include firearms, people/human trafficking, wildlife, oil, contraband & tobacco and bulk cash. Dr. Verrier emphasised that rivers have become important highways for trafficking within the region as they ae very rarely patrolled.
The concluding remarks were provided by SEACOP team leader Dominique Bucas, who provided three lessons learned. The first is that the maritime space is vast, and as such it remains the largest hub for trafficking in a multitude of commodities. Followed by the fact that commodities such as drugs or weapons flow along the same routes together with a diversity of less notorious goods such as timber, gold, cigarettes, scrap metal, and counterfeit goods. The third lesson, derived as a conclusion of the last two, is that a project like SEACOP cannot target all these illicit flows and specific priorities have to be made to gauge operational efforts in order to address different commodities. Additionally, the vast majority of law enforcement within the region is not trained in identifying these other illegal goods, seeing as their priority has primarily been drugs.
