In the second of two CITES-centric episodes, this episode finds David in conversation with Australian filmmaker Abraham Joffe – director of Trade Secret, the award-winning documentary exposing the global trade in polar bear skins. While climate change relentlessly erodes the sea ice these animals depend on, Abraham reveals how polar bears are still legally trophy-hunted, skinned and sold as luxury rugs and taxidermy, their fate decided in conference halls thousands of miles from the Arctic.

David and Abraham explore how Trade Secret follows journalists, advocates and Arctic guides – including previous guest Iris Ho – as they investigate both legal and illegal polar bear markets, and push for the species to be “uplisted” to the highest level of CITES protection. Along the way, they discuss the blurred line between filmmaking and journalism, the ethical weight that comes with shaping a story in the edit, and the power – and limits – of a documentary to change international policy.

Crucially, the conversation also turns north, to the Indigenous communities who have lived alongside polar bears for generations. Abraham reflects on the cultural and subsistence importance of traditional hunting, how little money actually reaches those communities from the luxury trade, and why giving polar bears the protection they deserve doesn’t have to mean erasing the people who share their icy home.

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Recorded on the outskirts of Samarkand, Uzbekistan, this episode finds David at the 20th Conference of the Parties to CITES – the global treaty that has regulated international trade in endangered species for the past 50 years. Inside, beneath flickering lights, 185 nation-states haggle over commas, clauses and quotas; at the back of the room sit conservation NGOs, animal welfare groups, trophy-hunting lobbyists, biomedical interests and import–export industries, all vying to shape the fate of the world’s wildlife.

Amid this diplomatic circus, just outside the expo centre, David sits down lakeside with Iris Ho, a proudly self-professed “CITES nerd”. Born in Taiwan and now based in Washington, DC, Iris is Head of Campaigns and Policy at the Pan-African Sanctuary Alliance (PASA) – the largest network of accredited primate sanctuaries in Africa. She explains how PASA’s work caring for rescued primates on the ground connects directly to the policies debated in those halls, and why a single well-crafted decision can protect far more animals than any one sanctuary ever could.

Together, they explore Iris’s efforts to up-list the golden-bellied mangabey to the highest level of CITES protection, to re-establish an international great ape enforcement task force, and the troubling case of a private “rescue centre” in India that has imported tens of thousands of wild animals under highly questionable circumstances. Along the way, Iris reflects on growing up in a Taiwan where shark fin soup went unchallenged, the quiet shift in public attitudes she’s witnessed across Asia, and how daily walks in her local DC nature reserve give her the strength to keep fighting for the natural world.

It’s an episode about primates and policy, hope and heartbreak – and about why, if we truly care for the wild lives we share this planet with, we might all need to become just a little bit more “nerdy” about treaties like CITES.

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Following on from the conversation with Dr Bhaskar Choudhury in the previous episode...

Recorded further south, near Bandhavgarh National Park in the Indian state of Madhya Pradesh, this bonus episode is with Amrit Menon, department head of the Wildlife Trust of India’s (WTI) Wild Aid division. This conversation looks not solely at rescue and rehabilitation, but at coexistence. What happens when wild animals are forced from their traditional habitats into states that have never before had to co-exist with them? For example, how do local farming communities adapt to life when their new neighbours are forty-five elephants strong?

This conversation details the WTI’s Rapid Action Projects - RAPS — funded in part by David Shepherd Wildlife Foundation. Think of RAPS as conservation’s Thunderbirds: small, nimble teams that drop into crisis zones, offer immediate help, and try to stop future problems before they grow. We’ll then head into the field — to meet with some of the farmers facing the daily reality of elephantine visits, and the RAP project manager there on the floor, Meghna Bandyopadhyay.

With thanks to David Shepherd Wildlife Foundation for making this episode possible.

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