Introduction

Each year, the global legal and illegal wildlife trades result in the capture and killing of billions of animals of a wide variety of species (Wyatt et al. 2021). One of the most trafficked animals is the European eel (Anguilla anguilla) (Alonso and van Uhm 2023; Europol 2022; Shiraishi and Crook 2015). Indeed, approximately 100 tonnesFootnote 1 of glass (unpigmented) eels [between the leptocephalus stage and the juvenile (elver) stage (see Fig. 1)] are smuggled into Asia each year to satisfy the global demand for eel meat (Europol 2022). In recent decades, this consumption of eel meat has led to a significant decrease in eel populations (see Dekker et al. 2003; Dekker 2019). Consequently, since 2010, the European eel has been listed as an endangered species by the Convention on the International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES), and it is illegal to import or export them outside European Union (EU) borders (Brufao Curiel 2020; Europol 2022).

Fig. 1
figure 1

Life cycle of the European eel (adapted from Dekker 2000). Note that spawning and eggs have never been observed in the wild. Permission to use granted on 4/20/2021

Full size image

Despite the large numbers of eels that are being traded illegally, their trafficking has been framed as an economic or environmental problem for the local communities who have fished and traded eels for hundreds of years, or, conversely, as a problem of biodiversity loss (see Wyatt et al. 2021). For instance, Brufao Curiel (2020) analyzes the declining numbers on a species level and treats it as conservation issue, while Alonso and van Uhm (2023: 2) regard the illegal European eel trade as one among many transnational trades of illegal “commodities.” Eels, however, as with other nonhuman animals, including fish, are sentient animals whose individual well-being needs to be taken into consideration (Balcombe 2016).

As Braithwaite (2010) explains, whether fish feel pain or not has been an ongoing debate over the last decades. While some authors deny that fish can feel pain (Key 2016), many others argue the opposite (Balcombe 2016; Braithwaite 2010; Braithwaite and Droege 2016; Sneddon and Leach 2016). Many fish also demonstrate cognitive abilities regarding memory and learning, cooperation, self-consciousness, and varying emotional states (see Balcombe 2016; Giménez Candela et al. 2020). Despite the seeming consensus on fish sentience, these animals are not only killed, but those who are farmed are kept in high-density crowded confines, fed fattening diets, and subsequently slaughtered. In fact, European eels are a species reared in closed recirculation systems, where they live in opaque, isolated tanks without any contact with their natural environment (Giménez Candela et al. 2020). Essentially, while the farmed trade can be legal within EU borders, it still causes significant harm.

This paper’s study of European eel trade and trafficking (the illegal trade) is framed within nonspeciesist criminology. Nonspeciesist criminology acknowledges that humans are not the only victims of crime and that nonhuman animals are often subjected to violence and abuse (see Beirne 1999; Cazaux 1999). Moreover, such an approach argues that this violence is structural, allowing the inclusion of both legal and illegal practices (see Sollund 2021a). From this perspective, this paper acknowledges that the trade and trafficking of European eels have devastating consequences for the eels involved. Eels are taken from their natural habitats and forced into captivity or killed for their meat. Besides leading to a population decline threatening the species with extinction, the eels involved are subjected to brutal treatment, including being smuggled in cramped and unsanitary conditions, being physically abused, and being deprived of their basic needs. Many eels also suffer from injuries or disease (Drouineau et al. 2018), as they are killed using cruel and indiscriminate methods (Wadiwel 2016).

This paper attempts to further reveal the violence against the animals within their legal and illegal trade with a focus on the inherent value of the individually traded animals rather than on the more macro-level impact on the species. The next section explains the methods employed to develop this research. From here, the paper provides an analysis of the harms of the legal and illegal trade of European eels. This section begins with an overview of the European eel life cycle before turning to their legal and illegal capture, their trafficking and trade, their consumption, and their reintroduction into the wild when seized. This is followed by the penultimate section, which calls for heightened attention to the “trees” (the individual eels who are victims of trade and traffic), which are often overlooked for the sake of the “forest” (survival of the species).

Methods

This qualitative research employs in-depth interviews, nonparticipant observation, and document analysis. First, I conducted fourteen open-ended semi-structured interviews between March 2022 and November 2022 with key stakeholders—eel fishers, eel traders,Footnote 2 law enforcement agents, and the scientific community. I followed a purposive sampling strategy, whereby participants were chosen based on their knowledge about and experience with glass eel trade and trafficking; I continued with snowball sampling until reaching theoretical saturation (see Ritchie et al. 2014). I recorded, transcribed, and analyzed the interviews using NVivo 12. In addition, I engaged in numerous informal conversations with law enforcement agents. I obtained informed consent from all participants before the start of the interview and have protected the participants’ identities by using gender-neutral pseudonyms (see Heaton 2021).

Nonparticipant observation took place from January to April 2022 in Ebre Delta (Catalonia), the Oria River (Basque Country), and the Nalón River (Asturias)—which are the most significant Spanish regions for the eel trade and for eel trafficking—and in November 2022 in the Transboundary Region of the Minho River (border between Spain and Portugal). I used nonparticipant observation to familiarize myself with the context in which this crime takes place. I recorded the information using fieldnotes and photographs. All the data collected were kept confidential to protect the participants’ identities. The research received ethical approval from  Universitat Rovira i Virgili on 10/29/2021 with the code CEIPSA-2021-TD-0018. All this information was triangulated with document analysis including academic literature, policy papers, reports, and legislation.

Finally, this article employs a visual approach to green (nonspeciesist) criminology (see McClanahan 2021; Natali, 2016; Natali and McClanahan 2017). As Copes (2020, para. 11) describes, visuals may be incorporated into criminological research to “show aspects of the life of the participants that often go unnoticed by others.” Initially, green criminologists used images to demonstrate the impact of environmental harm on (other) people, but now, they are expanding their use to call attention to the destruction of ecosystems and the loss of biodiversity (see Brisman and South 2013; Natali and McClanahan 2017). In this vein, the goal of Natali and McClanahan (2017: 201) is, for example, to “imagine how a mountain, a river or a forest feels”; the purpose of this article, in turn, is to imagine how the victims of wildlife trafficking and trade feel and to empathize with them. To this end, the article uses photographs of the legal and illegal trade as “evidence of harm” (McClanahan 2021: 38)—in other words, to uncover the impact of wildlife trade and trafficking on nonhumans. Drawing on Meijer (2019: 118), the article aims to expose the harms to nonhuman animals, arguing that “the exploitation of nonhuman animals and their invisibility are interrelated”—meaning that it is easier to exploit (trade, traffic, or eat) nonhuman animals if we do not see their suffering. Thus, the article asserts that by making visible the harms caused to nonhuman animals in the trafficking and trade of species, we can begin to account for and address the violence against them.

The Harms to the European Eels Caused by Their Trafficking and Trade

The European eel has a long and complex life cycle (Aranburu et al. 2015). Spawning and eggs have never been observed in the wild (Dekker 2000), but after the research conducted by the Danish scientist Johannes Schmidt, spawning is believed to happen at the Sargasso Sea (see Miller and Hanel 2011). As Dekker (2000) described, the hatched larvae, called leptocephalus, use the Gulf Stream and the North Atlantic Current to reach the continental shelf of the Atlantic coast of Europe and North Africa. Once they enter continental waters, they metamorphose into glass eels. Once glass eels reach the coast, they inhabit estuaries (where the freshwater and saltwater meet). Then, at the elver stage, they inhabit lagoons or lakes, or migrate up the river basin before becoming yellow eels, the longest of their life stages (Bevacqua et al. 2015). Once they are in continental waters (including lakes, rivers, or lagoons), they can settle or move across habitats, taking them up to fifty years to reach maturation and become silver eels (Fig. 1).

Once yellow eels metamorphose into silver eels, they undertake a 5000–7000 km journey southwest using the Canary and Azores current systems back at the southwestern region of the Sargasso Sea (Aarestrup 2009; Bornarel et al. 2018; Miller et al. 2019), where they are believed to spawn and die (Bevacqua et al. 2015; Dekker 2000). This complex and mysterious life cycle means that they cannot be bred in captivity, which would entail another set of harms. Because captive breeding has not been achieved, all the eels that are consumed are born in the wild, even if subsequently raised in aquaculture facilities (Drouineau et al. 2018). This section analyses the harms to the European eels from their capture to their consumption or reintroduction into the wild.

Legal and Illegal Fishing of Glass Eels

Depending on the region where the fishing takes place, the method employed to capture glass eels will be different. This paper describes the capture of eels using a bussó (Fig. 2).

Fig. 2
figure 2

Figure of a bussó—the traditional glass eel and elver trap in Catalonia, Spain. Photograph taken by the author at the Ecomuseu of Deltebre, Catalonia (Spain)

Full size image

A bussó is the fishing gear used to capture glass eels and elvers in Catalonia, Spain. Fishers place their bussons in the river margins when it gets dark. At nighttime, when the glass eels are more active, they enter the bussó through the hole but cannot escape because the bussó is set counterflow (placed in the water facing the current). This means that the captured eels will not be able to swim against the current to exit through the small hole they entered. The bussó is used for both legal and illegal fishing. What distinguishes “legal” and “illegal” fishing is whether the fisher has a license to capture eels during the season. If a fisher obtains a license, then that fisher also receives a tag with a serial number that needs to be placed on one’s bussó. If the fisher’s bussó lacks this identification number, then the catch is considered illegal.

Alex, one of the fishers I interviewed, explained that this fishing method is not harmful for the eels because the mortality of the eels who have been captured and are waiting to be removed from their habitat is very low. Still, taking into consideration the trauma associated with the capture of live fish (see Wadiwel 2016) and the fact that European eels are a migratory species whose movements have been restrained, the fishing method does entail harm. Moreover, the same fisher declared that while it is not harmful for the eels (in terms of mortality), it is not the case for the other fish that constitute bycatch (Fig. 3). As Alex explained, the other fish, who are smaller, tend to die. So, once they come back to remove the bussó from the water, they discard the dead fish and throw them back into the river. Thus, both the legal and illegal capture of glass eels harms the eels—and other individual fish—that are being caught because they are being taken from their habitat and their freedom of movement is denied.

Fig. 3
figure 3

Still figure from a video of the inside of a bussó showing captured glass eels and other fish species. Video sent by a participant. Permission to use granted on 5/31/2022

Full size image

Transit: Trading and Smuggling Glass Eels

Glass eels are captured in response to three different kinds of demands: for consumption (mostly in Spain), for reintroduction into a different habitat in an attempt to increase the population numbers in certain countries in the EU, or, conversely, and most predominantly, for farming and consumption at a later stage (see Kuroki et al. 2014). As mentioned above, European eels cannot be bred in captivity; thus, all the eels consumed, regardless the stage, come from the wild. This section presents the harms to the eels when they are victims of trade and trafficking for use as “seedings”Footnote 3 for aquaculture (Crook 2010: 2).

European eels have received protection at a species level. CITES has listed them in Appendix II which “includes species not necessarily threatened with extinction, but in which trade must be controlled in order to avoid utilization incompatible with their survival” (CITES n.d.b), and in 2010, the EU banned importing and exporting European eels outside its borders. Nevertheless, every year, 100 tonnes of glass eels are exported illegally to Asia (Europol 2022). Before the smuggling takes place—just as before being traded legally—eels suffer from confinement. As Dany, an eel trader, described, thousands of glass eels are kept in closed recirculation systems (see Fig. 4). As Florence, a member of the scientific community, explained, such closed recirculation systems are isolated tanks, meaning that the eels do not have any contact with their natural environment. As a result, many die before transit.

Fig. 4
figure 4

Eels in an EU aquaculture facility (“pools”) waiting to be smuggled to Asia. Photograph provided by the Nature Protection Service (Servicio de Protección de la Naturaleza (“SEPRONA”))’ agent. Permission to use granted on 2/15/2023

Full size image

To effectuate the illegal trade, legal traders and Asian groups work in collaboration to smuggle the eels out of the EU (Alonso and van Uhm 2023). If the Spanish or European eel traders smuggle the eels, the eels will be concealed in the cargo storage units of trucks and planes among other species or mislabeled as a different species (Fig. 5) (UNODC 2020)—a method that increased during the COVID-19 pandemic (Europol 2022).

Fig. 5
figure 5

Eels concealed in a box in airfreight cargo. Photograph provided by a SEPRONA agent. Permission to use granted on 2/15/2023

Full size image

If Asian groups are involved in smuggling the eels, the eels will be trafficked by “mules,” who transport them in suitcases (Europol 2022; UNODC 2020). As Europol (2022) has reported, the mules are often Asians holding EU citizenship or residence permits who get paid €1000 per trip. Both methods harm the trafficked individuals.

The sheer volume of eels that are trafficked is disturbing. Consider Fig. 6—one of the most reproduced photographs taken by SEPRONA—which highlights the extent of the illegal trade of glass eels, exemplifying the magnitude of the issue and the threat the illegal trade poses to the survival of the European eel.

Fig. 6
figure 6

Suitcases seized from an industrial unit in Algeciras ready to illegally transport eels. Photograph provided by a SEPRONA agent. Permission to use granted on 2/11/2023

Full size image

Looking at the “forest,” however—looking at the impact on the entire species—runs the risk of missing the individual “trees”—the individual eels, who experience the violence of the traffic. When mules smuggle the eels to Asia by plane in suitcases, hundreds of glass eels are bagged together, with some water and pressurized oxygen (Fig. 7). As Sam, a law enforcement agent told me, these bags are usually put into suitcases with frozen water bottles, to keep them cool (Fig. 8). If the trip lasts more than 40 hours, most of the eels will die of suffocation (Europol 2022). For this reason, as Sam stated, the flights to Asia need to be direct (or with as few layovers as possible). Understanding as much, however, has helped law enforcement agencies to identify the “hot routes” of eel trafficking.

Fig. 7
figure 7

Hundreds of glass eels inside the bags ready to be smuggled to Asia in a suitcase. Photograph provided by a SEPRONA agent. Permission to use granted on 2/15/2023

Full size image
Fig. 8
figure 8

Hundreds of glass eels inside the bags ready to be smuggled to Asia in a suitcase. Photograph provided by a SEPRONA agent. Permission to use granted on 2/15/2023

Full size image

The method of concealment illustrated in Figs. 7 and 8 is extremely harmful. Even if the eels survive, they suffer from stress. Florence, a member of the scientific community, explained that when eels are confined and suffer anxiety, they secrete ammonia (see also Da Silva et al. 2009), which can be seen with the naked eye (Fig. 9).

Fig. 9
figure 9

Eels secreting ammonia inside a bag used for smuggling. Photograph provided by a SEPRONA agent. Permission to use granted on 2/15/2023

Full size image

These high levels of anxiety are not limited to the illegal trade. As Dany, a trader, noted, glass eels always secrete ammonia; it is a normal reaction when they are under stress. For instance, Fig. 10 was taken at Dany’s trading facilities. So, despite being part of a “legal” supply chain (see Alonso and van Uhm 2023), the eels secrete ammonia, signaling how both trade and trafficking are stressful to the eels. In other words—and to put it bluntly—the eels do not know—and do not care—if they are being subjected to the legal trade or the illegal one: Both are harmful to them.

Fig. 10
figure 10

Eels secreting ammonia inside a container used in the legal trade. Still figure from a video recorded by the author at a trader’s facility on 2/3/2022

Full size image

Demand: An Appetite for Eel Meat

As mentioned above, eels are traded and trafficked for their meat, which is consumed all around the world (Europol 2022). The most popular eel dish nowadays is the charcoal-grilled eel called kabayaki, which is a traditional dish in Japanese cuisine (Kuroki et al. 2014; Ringuet et al. 2002). Although it is a dish that originated in Japan, its consumption is expanding globally. For instance, in Spain, people have tended to consume mostly glass eels, but in July 2021, Spanish traders introduced Anguilla Gastroweek. The Anguilla Gastroweek, based on the Japanese tradition, started with the objective of promoting the local consumption of eels while marketing them as a delicacy (Fig. 11). As Kim, a member of a nongovernmental organization, described, the idea behind Anguilla Gastroweek was to increase eel consumption in Spain and keep up demand.

Fig. 11
figure 11

Eel with roses and foie gras micuit marinated with matcha tea. Photograph provided by Chef Mendoza Ramos of the restaurant Boraz (Barcelona). Permission to use granted on 8/17/2021

Full size image

Despite the cultural dimension of consuming eels (both in terms of older traditions and with respect to newer customs), as well as the willingness of eel traders to increase or maintain their profits, farmed eels are tortured and killed inhumanely (Wadiwel 2016). As described above, the eels are captured in the wild, transported to aquaculture facilities, and raised (farmed) before slaughter. More specifically, this means that each individual eel is kept (imprisoned) in high-density opaque tanks and is fattened for months until reaching maturation, when it is then killed (see Giménez Candela 2020).

The killing method for farmed eels consists of two phases or stages. First, when the eels have been fattened sufficiently, they are placed in salt or liquid ammonia (Lambooij et al. 2002a, b; Robb et al. 2002). This washing or “desliming” is intended to remove the mucus produced to protect their skin. Ten minutes later, they are placed in water and the mucus is washed off. As described by Robb and colleagues (2002), at this point, the eels are exhausted but still conscious. Next, the conscious eels are killed by exsanguination. The whole process lasts about an hour, but as Robb and colleagues (2002) reveal, the eels are alive throughout the entire process.Footnote 4

As mentioned above, not all eel dishes involve farmed eels; in some parts of the world—mostly in Spain—people eat glass eels (Fig. 12). Glass eels, or angulas, as they are called in Spanish, are a traditional food. As Nagore Irazuegi, the owner of the restaurant Arima, explained in an interview, in Spain, eating glass eels is a matter of culture (Randolph 2018). On Christmas Eve or New Year’s Eve, it is customary to eat them, and, as Nagore Irazuegi noted, this practice ties people together and creates a sense of belonging (Randolph 2018). Nevertheless, despite the social importance of consuming glass eels—and despite the fact that glass eels are not subjected to the horrors of farming—glass eel consumption is not free of harm. During my observations, I witnessed how the glass eels were trying to escape from the container in which they were placed at a trader’s facilities. My experiences were similar to those of Capel (2014: 1), who reported that “in the back room of a cider house, inside a metal bowl, the eels were attempting to climb up the edges.” This behavior has been observed before in farmed fish and, as Wadiwel (2016) makes clear, it is a sign of anguish. By showing resistance, glass eels, and other fish, communicate their suffering caused by their captivity.

Fig. 12
figure 12

Spanish traditional “tapa” of spicy garlic glass eels. Photograph taken by the author on the 3/30/2022 at a Spanish restaurant during the 2021–2022 glass eel season

Full size image

In addition, Capel (2014) expounds, glass eels are killed with “tobacco infusion” intended to remove the mucus and slime from the glass eels. As Alex and other participants explained to me:

to prepare the tobacco infusion requires one to grab a couple of cigarettes, any brand is okay, and boil the tobacco in water. Once it is ready, you can leave it aside to cool down. Then, you have to strain it and immerse the live eels into the resulting water. It will take a few minutes for them to die. [my translation]

This method might seem inhumane, but as stated by another participant, it is preferable to the alternative. This second method used to cook the most popular glass eel’s recipe in Spain—angulas a la bilbaína (spicy garlic glass eels)—is to heat olive oil in a clay pot and when the oil is hot, cook the glass eels alive.

Reintroduction: Returning the Eel into the Wild

As mentioned above, European glass eels are captured for the purpose of consumption at this stage of their life cycle, or they are captured and raised (farmed and fattened) and then consumed. The third purpose for capture is for restocking. Restocking is meant to be a measure to help European eel populations recover—specifically, by reintroducing them in places where the eel population has dropped considerably. As Florence explained to me, however, the scientific community questions the usefulness of this measure. First, because the European eel constitutes one single stock, for this to be an effective method, one would have to demonstrate that the eels will have a greater chance of surviving and getting back to the Sargasso Sea if removed from one place and reintroduced in another. Second, eels have a magnetic orientation mechanism, which means that the trip undertaken as a leptocephalus and as a glass eel stays imprinted in them so that they can return to the Sargasso Sea from the specific region they inhabited (e.g., the Minho River, the Loire River, and the Ebre River). According to Florence,

If you catch an eel in Spain and move her to Norway, you will see how she will manage to know the way back home… Some groups of interest have invested a lot of money in demonstrating that they can go back, but they only demonstrated that they can leave and reach the Baltic. But it does not mean anything, they [can] leave, yes, but if they do not arrive at the Sargasso Sea… it will not help at all! [my translation]

In addition, as Wyatt (2022) explains, when law enforcement agents succeed in disrupting wildlife trafficking operations and animals are rescued, victimization still occurs. In Sollund’s (2021b: 8) words, “although CITES provides suggestions concerning the care of seized and confiscated animals, many countries may have failed to articulate and practice appropriate solutions concerning the welfare of these animals.” In the case of the European eels, after they have been seized by law enforcement agents, the eels will still suffer during their reintroduction into the wild (Fig. 13). This suffering occurs at several different junctures and for a number of different reasons. First, after law enforcement has seized a shipment of trafficked eels, obtaining the necessary authorization for reintroduction takes some time. As a SEPRONA agent explained, the longer it takes, the higher the chances of the eels dying before reintroduction. Second, as a member of the scientific community described to me, when glass eels are reintroduced in a new habitat, the process tends to involve large numbers of eels being placed in one specific location at the same time, making it harder for them to survive because they have to compete for the same resources. Moreover, as various participants noted, the reintroduction of seized eels sometimes looks like a media show. According to them, sometimes it seems as if a lot of people representing different governmental authorities prioritize the photograph to prove their interest, but they demonstrate little concern about how to stop the trafficking in the first place and even less for the well-being of the eels themselves.

Fig. 13
figure 13

Reintroduction of glass eels after being seized in Spain. Photograph of a law enforcement agent with SEPRONA (provided by a SEPRONA agent). Permission to use granted on the 04/20/2023

Full size image

Furthermore, on at least one occasion (according to a member of the scientific community), the reintroduction took place above the dams constructed along the river in which the reintroduction was taking place. This means that when these eels attempt to migrate back to the Sargasso Sea, they will find a barrier that will put their lives in peril (see Pons-Hernandez 2024). As a member of a nongovernmental organization told me, eels are killed on a daily basis by hydropower turbines (Fig. 14). Essentially, as some participants claimed, the choice of site of reintroduction demonstrates little concern on the part of the authorities for the survival and well-being of the seized eels. As found on at least one occasion, the authorities attempted to leave the decision to law enforcement agents with limited knowledge about the biology of the species.

Fig. 14
figure 14

Eels killed by turbines highlighting the impact of hydropower mortality. Photography by Ingemar Alenas of the Sustainable Eel Group. Permission to use granted on 4/24/2023

Full size image

Missing the Trees for the Forest: The Need to Reveal the Harms to Trafficked and Traded Animals

As this paper has attempted to demonstrate, the direct consequence of the trafficking and trade of species is the harm, suffering, and death of the individual animals (Maher and Sollund 2016; Nurse and Wyatt 2020; Wyatt 2014, 2022). Despite the impact on the individual animals, most criminological attention to wildlife trafficking has focused on its impacts on populations, on biodiversity loss, or on humans (especially in terms of cultural dynamics and economic concerns). Even the concentration on populations and biodiversity loss, however, has been highly anthropocentric. In other words, it focuses mostly on the impact that the loss of biodiversity can have on humans (see Brisman and South 2019; Sollund 2019; Wyatt et al. 2021). In this vein, although CITES specifies that “its aim is to ensure that international trade in specimens of wild animals and plants does not threaten the survival of the species” (CITES n.d.a), as Sollund (2019) indicates, and as my research has found, CITES does not protect species; it simply facilitates their ongoing exploitation.

As noted at the outset, the European eel is listed in Appendix II of CITES, but, as has been the case with other species, this does not reduce the high demand for its consumption (see, e.g., Nurse and Wyatt 2020). In line with what Hutchinson and her coauthors (2021) have found, whether a species is listed in a CITES appendix and what level of protection it is afforded (with species on Appendix I granted the greatest amount of protection) is often based on political-economic interests reflecting a degree of speciesism and bias based on species charisma. As Hutchinson (2023) explains—and as my research confirms—the European eel is a species that is valued mainly for its market price. According to Europol (2022), the economic value of European eels is very high; therefore, their conservation is built around maximizing market value by keeping the trade “sustainable,” although “sustainability” does not mean that individuals are not harmed and tortured—nor that their trade is not threatening the species with extinction. In this way, the intrinsic value of individual eels is of little concern in the conservation policies of the entire species. As the previous section revealed, eels are harmed all along the supply chain regardless of legality (trade or trafficking). Thus, the protection of the European eel (and of other species) has come about because of threats to the survival of the species, not the individuals; a focus on the violence to which the individuals are subjected is absent. In theory and in practice, then, as long as overall population levels remain at some determined figure, it is irrelevant to CITES, the EU, and law enforcement agents how the individual eels are treated (see Baker et al. 2013; Fajardo 2024; Sollund 2022).

To further understand this dynamic, it can be helpful to look at seizure numbers. Europol (2022) states that the mortality rate in European eel trafficking is exceptionally high. For example, Planelles (2022) reports a case of eel trafficking in Spain, where of the 65 kg of eels that were being trafficked, only 2 kg survived—approximately three percent. Figures such as weight and percentages are misleading, however. One kg of eels is roughly 2800–3000 individual eels. Thus, in this particular situation, between 113,400 and 189,000 individual eels lost their lives in transit; the remaining “lucky” ones—those 5600–6000 that survived—were able to enjoy their lives a bit longer—until they were reintroduced, fished again, slaughtered, and consumed.

The Wildlife Trade Portal reports that 5524 kg of eels were seized between 2016 and 2020, which means that between 15,467,200 and 16,572,700 eels were seized. When mammals are trafficked, the figures used usually reflect the calculated number of individuals; with fish, in contrast, the calculation is by weight. This, in a similar way to what Sollund (2021a) describes under the section “Words are not ‘Just Words’,” debases the intrinsic value of each of the individual nonhumans that are being trafficked, objectifying them, and placing them at a lower level than that of human animals and other nonhuman but more charismatic animals (see Wyatt 2022). To put this in more concrete terms, consider the title of an article in The New York Post by O’Neill (2022): “Illegal immigrant busted at border with 76 migrants crammed inside truck.” If we ascribe a weight of 150 lbs or 68 kg to each individual, imagine the reaction if the title read: “Illegal immigrant busted at border with 11,400 lbs (5168 kg) of humans crammed inside truck”?! The words we use to describe or refer to nonhuman animals matter (see Sollund 2021a; Beirne 2018; Wyatt 2022)—and units of measurement are no different. Referring to eels as individual eels, just like referring to humans as individual humans not only helps to quantify the extent of the harm (see Nijman and Shepherd 2021), but to qualify it—making visible the direct victims of wildlife trade and trafficking because fish, and other animals, are subject to large-scale systems of violence.

Wadiwel (2016) argues that we need to conceptualize social justice for animals as not just reducing their suffering but relief from human-imposed violence, regardless of legality. Because traded and trafficked animals are harmed along the supply chain, the individual victims of wildlife trade and trafficking require the attention of criminology. Despite protecting the species through the goal of maintaining “sustainable” levels of exploitation, the consumption of, in this case, European eels denies the existence of the individuals whose life is being terminated (Probyn 2016). This is consistent with Sebo (2022: 44), who submits:

We need to evaluate them [nonhuman animals] not only at the species level, by considering our impacts on biodiversity, but also at the individual level, by considering our impacts on animal welfare. After all, nonhuman animals are more than parts of a whole […]. They are living, breathing, thinking, feeling individuals, and what they need as individuals can differ from what they need as a species.

Essentially, we are all familiar with the phrase “missing the forest for the trees”—which is used to describe when someone misses the big picture or fails to appreciate a larger situation or problem because one is considering only a few parts of it. Here, with wildlife trafficking, in general, and European eels, in particular, we have the reverse dynamic: We see the forest (the species), but we miss the individual trees (eels) that comprise it.

Conclusion

This paper has drawn on research that demonstrates that the trade and trafficking of the European eel species have devastating consequences for the individual eels, leading to harm, suffering, and death. Unfortunately, attention to wildlife trafficking, as a whole, has focused mostly on its impacts on humans or biodiversity loss, rather than on the direct harm to individual animals. Even when species are listed in a CITES appendix, such as the European eel, the violence they suffer is ignored. The protection of species—endangered or not—should center not on the threat to their survival, but to the violence they endure. The European eel serves as a prime example of the need to shift our attention to the violence and harm animals experience during trafficking and trade, not on issues of legality or population levels. The case of European eels serves to highlight both the number of individuals trafficked and traded every year, and the harm intrinsic to the trafficking and trade of living animals. As I have discussed in this paper, the number of eels affected by the trade and trafficking is staggering, with millions being seized annually. The way we count those affected is crucial, and thinking of them as individuals helps to not only quantify the extent of the harm, but to make its victims visible.

In order to effectively address the harm from wildlife trade and trafficking, it is necessary to shift away from an anthropocentric perspective that focuses solely on the impacts on humans or on biodiversity loss. Instead, we must prioritize the intrinsic value of individual animals and recognize the violence they experience as a result of human activity. This requires a paradigm shift in the way we think about and treat nonhuman animals, one that recognizes their individuality and inherent value. While protecting entire species of endangered animals is important, it should not come at the expense of individual animals’ lives and well-being. By prioritizing the intrinsic value of animals and recognizing the violence they experience, we can work toward creating a more just and compassionate society for all beings.