Action

Reduce impact of amphibian trade

How is the evidence assessed?
  • Effectiveness
    76%
  • Certainty
    40%
  • Harms
    0%

Key messages

  • One review found that reducing trade in two frog species through legislation allowed populations to recover from over-exploitation.

 

About key messages

Key messages provide a descriptive index to studies we have found that test this intervention.

Studies are not directly comparable or of equal value. When making decisions based on this evidence, you should consider factors such as study size, study design, reported metrics and relevance of the study to your situation, rather than simply counting the number of studies that support a particular interpretation.

Supporting evidence from individual studies

  1. A review in 2011 (Altherr, Goyenechea & Schubert 2011) found that reducing trade in green pond frog Euphlyctis Hexadactylus and the Indian bullfrog Hoplobatrachus tigerinus through legislation allowed populations to recover from over-exploitation. Both species were categorized by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) as stable in the 2010 IUCN Red List. Populations of both species had crashed in India and Bangladesh following unsustainable use in the frog leg trade. Over three years of monitoring in India, it was estimated that 9,000 tonnes of frogs were removed from the wild for frogs’ legs. In 1985, green pond frogs and Indian bullfrogs were listed in Appendix II of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Flora and Fauna (CITES). India banned export of frogs’ legs in 1987 and Bangladesh followed in 1989.

    Study and other actions tested
Please cite as:

Smith, R.K., Meredith, H. & Sutherland, W.J. (2020) Amphibian Conservation. Pages 9-64 in: W.J. Sutherland, L.V. Dicks, S.O. Petrovan & R.K. Smith (eds) What Works in Conservation 2020. Open Book Publishers, Cambridge, UK.

Where has this evidence come from?

List of journals searched by synopsis

All the journals searched for all synopses

Amphibian Conservation

This Action forms part of the Action Synopsis:

Amphibian Conservation
What Works 2021 cover

What Works in Conservation

What Works in Conservation provides expert assessments of the effectiveness of actions, based on summarised evidence, in synopses. Subjects covered so far include amphibians, birds, mammals, forests, peatland and control of freshwater invasive species. More are in progress.

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