MUSEUM biologists, accustomed to being on the right side in the battle for biodiversity, are angry and confused after discovering that they have been breaking American law for more than a decade.
In order to describe and categorise organisms, biologists often lend specimens to colleagues in other museums or send unknown organisms to other experts for identification. According to the Association of Systematics Collections, a professional organisation for natural history museums, more than a million shipments of this sort enter or leave the US each year. Late last year, however, after the government threatened to prosecute several scientists, word spread over the Internet that many, if not most, of these international shipments violated American law.
The news sent a chill through the back rooms of the country鈥檚 natural history museums at a time when biodiversity is taking centre stage as an international issue. 鈥淭his is threatening to shut down the whole scientific exchange procedure, which is the process by which systematic biologists do their research,鈥� says Elaine Hoagland, executive director of the association. Being able to identify and classify plants and animals is important to conservationists because any attempt to preserve diversity depends on knowing what is there to be protected.
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The scientists鈥� concern centres on a relatively obscure law called the Lacey Act. The main purpose of the law is to prevent commercial dealers from importing wildlife collected illegally in other countries. The act requires that all shipments of animal material must enter the country via customs brokers at one of eleven ports of entry, not through the post. Importers must prove that the specimens were collected legally in their country of origin.
While such restrictions make sense for commercial importers of wildlife products, they are almost impossible for museums to comply with, argue museum staff. Shipping specimens through customs brokers takes longer and is more expensive than sending material through the mail. Jean-Marc Gagnon, chief of invertebrate collections at the Canadian Museum of Nature in Ottawa, says many museums, already strapped for funds and staff time, would be forced to cut back on the number of loans they make to institutions in the US.
The other requirement 鈥� that importers prove their specimens were collected legally 鈥� poses even greater problems because many museum specimens are decades or even centuries old. 鈥淚 see absolutely no reason why we should be held accountable for things that happened before 1900,鈥� complains Robert Inger, curator emeritus of amphibians and reptiles for the Field Museum of Natural History in Chicago.
And, as specimens without permits can be seized as contraband, museums may become reluctant to lend valuable, often irreplaceable, specimens. Scott Lanyon, head of the division of birds at the Field Museum, says: 鈥淚鈥檓 the caretaker of these specimens. I can only take so many risks with them.鈥�
The scientists are overreacting, says special agent Frank Shoemaker of the US Fish and Wildlife Service, which has the job of enforcing the regulations. He points out that the Lacey Act has been on the books for more than 13 years, during which time museums have had few problems.
Inspectors are unlikely to insist on permits for old specimens, he says, pointing out that there are only 200 agents to police the entire country. 鈥淲e鈥檙e not out there hiding in every mailbox. I鈥檓 impressed they think we鈥檙e that effective.鈥� Indeed, he suggests that the service has a policy of turning a blind eye to incoming shipments by mail. On the other hand, he says, 鈥渋f you get ten shipments a month [by mail] and you continue to do this, we鈥檙e going to write you a letter鈥�.
Contradictory statements like these are frustrating for museum staff, because any given shipment could be deemed legal or illegal on the whim of an inspector, who can decide either to follow the letter of the law or the department鈥檚 more relaxed but unofficial policy. 鈥淲e don鈥檛 know where we stand,鈥� says Lanyon.
In September, the service proposed changes to the regulations, mostly to modify the fees charged to commercial importers. But during the time allowed for public comment, which ended last month, scientists mounted a major letter-writing campaign to try to persuade the government to grant a special exemption for shipments of scientific specimens between museums The service expects to release the revised regulations in a few months.