Exploring socio-technological-ecological dimensions of Asian songbird trade.

Since its inception, conservation has grappled with the ‘problem’ of wildlife trade, often overlooking the experience of animals, plants, and humans involved in the trade chain. By integrating political ecology, machine learning, and design theory, this thesis redefines wildlife trade as a multifaceted issue, or a ‘wicked problem’. The thesis focuses on the trade of live songbirds as pets in Indonesia, a trade deeply embedded in culture, monetized, diverse, and often illegal. Given increasing trade, the International Union for the Conservation of Nature termed the phenomenon of over-harvesting birds as the Asian Songbird Crisis (ASC). I examine the premise that species identification is a significant barrier to combating the illegal songbird trade in Indonesia and explore the development of taxonomic aids for conservation law enforcement. I show that image-based machine learning shows promise for identifying birds in complex trade environments (Chapter 2). However, focusing on a single solution, like a taxonomic aid, may solve some issues (species identification) while exacerbating others (enforcement challenges). Enforcement mostly focuses on community-based policing and education for vendors (socialisasi) (Chapter 3). In Chapter 4, I explore user-centered design of taxonomic aids with conservation law enforcement (CLE). Barriers to technology adoption include the social acceptability of bird trade, corruption, and the need for verbal evidence in court. There are diverse attitudes towards the ASC, with many CLE actors not recognizing the crisis label. Market mechanisms shift harvesting pressure onto similar species, suggesting a sustainability-focused narrative may be more productive (Chapter 5). Chapter 6 develops a more-than-human political ecology approach, exploring the interconnectedness between people and birds in trade. This chapter highlights previously obscured harms to birds, such as feather plucking, dismemberment, and overcrowding. Future research should explore alternatives to punitive measures to address unsustainable wildlife trade embedded within complex cultural practices.