A dataset of the crackdown on cross-border wildlife crimes in China, 2014-2020

Wildlife crimes that involve smuggling threaten national
security and biodiversity, cause regional conflicts, and hinder economic
development, especially in developing
countries with abundant wildlife resources. Over the past few decades, significant headway has been made in combating wildlife smuggling and the related illegal domestic trade in China. Previous studies on the wildlife smuggling trade were mostly based on customs punishment and confiscation data. From the China Judgments Online website, we retrieved cases related to cross-border wildlife and wildlife products smuggling from 2014 to 2020. A total of 510 available cases and 927 records for more than 110 species were registered. We thoroughly studied each judgment and ruling file to extract information on cases, defendants, species, sentences, and origins and destinations of wildlife and wildlife products. Furthermore, frequency of origin-destination place occurrences and spatial patterns of cross-border wildlife crime in China were shown in this data paper. The main purpose of our dataset is to make these wildlife and wildlife products trade data accessible for researchers to develop conservation studies. We expect that this dataset will be valuable for network analysis of regional or global wildlife trafficking, which has attracted global attention. There are no copyright restrictions on the data; we ask that researchers please cite this paper and the associated dataset when using the data in publications.