Kenya’s ‘ant-men’ bust exposes lucrative underground trade

NAIROBI: Kenyan police who raided a national park guesthouse earlier this month aimed not to bust elephant tusk or rhino horn poachers but a more esoteric ring trading a much smaller, more lucrative item by weight - queen ants.

Two Belgian teenagers were arrested for wildlife trafficking at Jane Guesthouse in Naivasha on the edge of Hell’s Gate National Park. They, along with a Vietnamese man and a Kenyan national also accused of ant trafficking, pleaded guilty and will be sentenced on May 7, a magistrate said on Wednesday.“It gives them self-esteem. When they stroke the horse, the therapy starts because this is a very big animal compared to their height, and they are not scared to stroke the horse ... and then to ride it and tell the horse what they want,” she said.

De Meyer works with children with a range of

conditions or disabilities, including autism, attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder, Down syndrome, those who are nonverbal or touch sensitive, and some who were born with fetal alcohol syndrome and have developmental problems.

She has received interest from other countries in Africa and Asia to start similar programs there.

Kenyan prosecutors have valued the seizures of queens taken from giant African harvester ant colonies at about 1.2 million Kenyan shillings ($9,300).

Depending on the number and variety of each species found, however, Reuters calculated the haul would have been worth as much as $1 million if it had reached European shores.

“It’s like cocaine,” said Dino Martins, director of the Turkana Basin Institute and one of Kenya’s leading insect experts. “The price of cocaine in Colombia versus getting a kilogram in the European market is such a big value addition, that’s why people do it.”

Based on the average cost of giant African harvester ants at six retailers in Britain, each of the roughly 5,440 queens seized at Nairobi airport according to court documents is worth around £175 ($233).