The silent forest pangolin

It’s a small, solitary, nocturnal, armour-plated, ant- eating mammal. It’s the most trafficked animal on earth. It’s highly prized for it’s poor-quality meat, which will cost you $350US a kilo in a Hanoi restaurant, and the powdered residue of it’s roasted scales (that armour plating.) Why?  Pangolin are sold (always illegally) by weight. Their perfect protection against all predators except man is to curl up in a tight impenetrable ball. Lions and tigers simply cannot prise them open. A man just picks them up and carries them off in a plastic bag. Then water is injected beneath the scales, and a mixture of water and cornstarch or stones is force-fed into their stomachs. Having increased their value by as much as a third, bloated and dying, they are transported by the ton and sold alive both locally and to the huge market in China.  We talk to the people rescuing and trying to heal injured pangolin before releasing them (secretly) back into the wild; to traditional medical practitioners, vets and villagers. And we ask why does it matter if the pangolin becomes extinct, as it surely will, in Asia. Guests: Thai Ngyuen, director, Save Vietnam's Wildlife; Maddie Rusman, technical advisor, Save Vietnam's Wildlife; Lan Ho, communications officer, Save Vietnam's Wildlife; Din Van Than, keeper, Cuc Phuong National Park; Madelon Willemson, director TRAFFIC, Vietnam; Qui Duc, journalist. Produced with Neil Trevithick. Sound Engineer: Judy Rapley September 2017.