Earth Live interviews Andrea Crosta, Executive Director of Earth League International on their work infiltrating and bringing to justice the ringleaders of a criminal network that stretched from Mexico to China and is responsible for pushing the endangered vaquita to the brink of extinction.
As the smallest whale in the world, the tiny vaquita has been caught up in the trade of the totoaba, another fish whose bladder is sought after for Chinese medicine and which has become the centre of an international conservation effort which featured in the Nat Geo documentary Sea of Shadows.
Andrea’s organization comprises 12 international teams of undercover investigators working across three continents. Comprising former FBI and CIA operatives his team are dedicating their lives to saving our planet's most endangered wildlife.
He is a founding member of the Wildlife Justice Commission in the Hague, Netherlands, a member of the board of The Africa Conservancy Foundation, and the creator and project manager of WildLeaks, the world's first wildlife-crime whistleblower initiative. He is the co-author of the first investigation into ivory trafficking and terrorism - "Africa's White Gold of Jihad: al-Shabaab and Conflict Ivory" (2010-2012) - which changed forever the narrative around the issue of elephant poaching and ivory trafficking.
If you have experience in law enforcement and are interested in joining his team and/or would like to make a donation, please visit them here.