Dr WASHER (11:38 AM) —I lend my wholehearted support to the Wildlife Protection (Regulation of Exports and Imports) Amendment Bill 1998 [1999] . In doing so I would like to congratulate the Howard government, in particular Senator Robert Hill, on the formation of major legislation due to be debated in the House, the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Bill 1998 [1999] . This will make quite a substantive change to the way in which the Commonwealth has the power to protect our environment and, along with the amendment we are discussing here today, will ensure Australia meets its responsibility and maintains its reputation as a world leader in environmental conservation.

In the three years this government have been in power, their leadership on environmental policy has been impressive, in particular the $1 billion Natural Heritage Trust, the largest environmental rescue package ever to be undertaken in this country. It is now making a tangible difference around Australia with projects covering the broad spectrum of environmental restoration and conservation.

As my electorate is bordered by the Indian Ocean, the government's oceans policy has generated a lot of keen interest and, once again, demonstrates Australia's leadership in marine and coastal protection. The policy will put our nation in a strong position when dealing with the raft of issues confronting the long-term future of our oceans.

The Wildlife Protection (Regulation of Exports and Imports) Amendment Bill 1998 [1999] seeks to tighten Australia's stance on buying and selling medical products that contain endangered animals and plants in their ingredients. The amendments will see tough penalties enforced on the retailers or exporters who use these products. This amendment bill also makes it a criminal offence to import, export or possess a product that is `represented' to contain material from an endangered species. This is to prevent producers of traditional medicine who cannot afford the endangered product—or it is unattainable—from still listing it as an ingredient for marketing purposes or just as a plain con. This amendment enables Australia to further meet its obligations under the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora 1973. Australia has been an active participant in the application of this convention. The amendment also brings us up to speed with the United States and the European Union, both of whom have implemented similar laws.

I believe all Australians support the protection of endangered animals and plants both here and abroad. As we witnessed the extinction of hundreds of species over the last century, it is no longer a question of whether or not we should protect what is remaining, but how we protect it. Species like the black rhinoceros, as we have heard, have all but disappeared, with 95 per cent of its population being hunted between 1970 and 1993 for Chinese medicine. As with the tiger, Chinese medicine has proved to be a greater threat than the loss of habitat.

Although animals make up only a small part of alternative medicine and Chinese medicine, this is an industry that is indeed growing. In fact, Chinese medicine is used by one-quarter of the world's population. In China, it is an industry worth more than $2 billion each year and Chinese medicine requires about 1.6 million tonnes of ingredients each year.

As a trend for many Australians seeking alternatives to Western medicine grows, it is an industry that will no doubt flourish in this country as well. As we all know, Chinese medicine has been practised for thousands of years, and I want to make it clear that, even though I have practised Western medicine for 26 years, I am in no way denigrating this alternative by supporting the bill. In fact, Western medicine has adopted many treatments from Chinese medicine. For example, the drug ephedrine, which was used in the treatment of asthma, is extracted from a plant that Chinese medicine practitioners have been using for centuries. Western doctors have now hailed an ingredient extracted from daisies for over 1,500 years in Chinese medicine as a treatment for malaria.

I am pleased to see that practitioners in Chinese medicine in Australia have supported the measures outlined in this bill, and they are keen to produce alternatives for their patients. The President of the New South Wales Association of Chinese Medicine, Yifan Yang, agrees that there are alternatives to treatments that traditionally used endangered animals as ingredients. It was encouraging to see that for back pain he prescribed physiotherapy rather than tiger extract and buffalo horn, and panadol rather than rhino horn to control fever. Perhaps the Chinese medicine industry could also substitute the traditional aphrodisiac, deer horn, with a modern aphrodisiac, Viagra, as mentioned formerly. The former has to be farmed to prevent extinction because of this treatment, while the latter is readily available, endangers no animal, and is probably a lot cheaper.

The problem we face globally, however, is that many practitioners of Chinese medicine outside Australia do not believe that substitutes for traditional ingredients work. They also believe that farm species are not as effective as those animals and plants found in the wild. This is a belief that is also supported by their patients, and products with ingredients from the wild attract a far higher price tag than those which have been farmed. Ingredients which have been cultivated rather than collected from the wild only make up 20 per cent of the Chinese medicine market. Of course, a fundamental problem we have in changing the ways of traditional practitioners in China, Korea and Japan is that many acknowledge some species are in danger of becoming extinct, but believe saving the lives of humans is more important.

This bill is indeed a step in the right direction, but I hope Australia and other like-minded countries continue a dialogue with China, Korea and Japan against the use of endangered species in Chinese medicine. I understand there are cultural sensitivities and genuine reasons against using farmed ingredients, in particular some plants and animals which simply do not grow or reproduce in captivity. However, there is a need for a more effective deterrent when it comes to saving the last of these species.

We should also be careful that the alternatives do not create further harm. Who could forget the heart-wrenching stories of bear farming in China where thousands of bears are kept in tiny cages with a permanent tube inserted into their gall bladders which constantly collects bile used in Chinese medicine. Furthermore, some of the species that have been put up as alternatives to endangered species have themselves become endangered for the same reasons.

For us to be successful, we need to focus on education and not confrontation. We need to appeal to the Chinese medicine industry to consider the long-term viability of their practices. If they understand that, when these species become extinct they will no longer have that ingredient to use, hopefully they will begin to seek alternatives.

News on this front is not all doom and gloom. The trade monitoring program arm of the World Wide Fund for Nature, which is known as TRAFFIC, has met with representatives from the Chinese medicine profession in Asia and has had ongoing dialogue since 1995. In 1997 China signed a formal resolution drawn up by the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora which recognises that the use of endangered species in Chinese medicines threatens their survival.

It is now up to countries such as China to make a concerted effort with both the practitioners in their countries as well as the consumers to put an end to the medical products that contain endangered species. I congratulate TRAFFIC's approach to this issue which appears to be making a difference, albeit slowly. It is a particularly emotional subject for many people, and justifiably so, but this often leads to protests and confrontation that in particular cultures do more harm than good. Basically, since the opium wars, China has not much cared for being told what to do by the Western world. This is not a black and white issue. The World Wide Fund for Nature obviously recognises this and deals with this issue appropriately.

I welcome the move to legislate that ingredients listed on the labels of Chinese medicine will be proof enough for successful prosecution if the product contains endangered plants or animals. Previously we had to rely, as you heard before, on DNA testing of the ingredients to establish proof and this can be inconclusive and costly. Perhaps it will also make producers of Chinese medicine who pretend to have endangered species in their ingredients think twice before they list them on the label, as this alone will lead to prosecution. Prosecution of offences outlined in this bill will be extremely important. There is no point in legislating against endangered species in Chinese medicine if we cannot police it. If you will excuse the pun, Australia does not want to be seen as a toothless tiger.

A similar move to use the ingredients listed on the pack was made by the Therapeutic Goods Administration some 10 years go and I understand this has made a marked improvement on the number of successful prosecutions. I commend this bill to the Main Committee and hope that it is part of a continuing push to see that those plants and animals on the verge of extinction are no longer hunted or collected from the wild for any purpose.