Animal trafficking is big business. Every year thousands of Brazil’s animals begin their journey to the US and Europe from the city of Belem do Para. Warning: contains disturbing images.

Warning: the accompanying film contains disturbing images of animals

For weeks we had been speaking with everybody involved in animal trafficking, from NGOs to the police and the traffickers themselves, writes Guillermo Galdos.

We knew Belem do Para, in the north east corner of Brazil, was one of the country’s main places for animal trafficking. The city lies where the Amazon river meets the Atlantic.

People don’t really think that animal trafficking is big business. But after drugs and weapons, animal trafficking is the third most profitable illegal trade, making billions of dollars a year.

The hunter

We met Carlos deep in the Amazon jungle. He had been hunting all his life. He hunts animals to eat and he captures animals to sell. He lives from the forest, as many people do down here.

He is aware his kids might not be able to do the same job. There are not enough animals for them to continue with the tradition. If Carlos did not capture animals, his family wouldn’t have enough money to survive. He is poor. He supports a family of five on less than 300 dollars a month.

Carlos is at the bottom of the trafficking chain. He only gets a few dollars for each monkey, sloth, bird or reptile that he takes away from the Amazon rainforest. The ones who make money sell the animals abroad.

The trafficker

An animal trafficker agreed to speak with us. He was timid. He felt a bit ashamed of his business, but on the other hand, he felt (as many do) it was the only way to sustain his family. He said that his clients flew the animals in chartered planes to America and Europe. “If one out of 10 survives, the business is good.”

He had been in jail for trafficking animals but that had not put him off continuing in the business. “The animals are just there and people are aware that foreigners pay lots of money for them,” he said.

He has sold hundreds, if not thousands, of different creatures that inhabit the Amazon rainforest. He says that nowadays it is more difficult to trade with animals than it was before: “We used to have the animals or birds just in the market, but now the police do regular checks.”

The police

We went off with eight police officers in two boats patrolling the Para river. The sergeant in charge of the operation was complaining that they don’t have enough money to do their job. The boats they had for the operation were given to them by a fishing company.

After three hours of casting gasoline and getting burned by the wild Amazon heat, we saw two boats. The police approached them but there were no animals.

One had a family hiding from the heat and resting in their hammocks; the other boat contained fishermen coming back to the city after a day working.

It was clear that it was a very difficult mission to patrol the immense territory of the Amazon jungle. I thought about the trafficker and how he told us that most of the animals are moved at night, under the cover of darkness.

Guillermo Galdos is a journalist and filmmaker