KEY POINTS:
Usually it's the aircraft at Auckland International Airport which carry the passengers. South African Pillipus Fourie had passengers of his own.
Forty-four of them, to be precise. Parrots' eggs, smuggled away in an under-the-clothes vest with special compartments for the precious cargo.
Fourie was carrying a shipment potentially worth up to $1.3m into New Zealand. Each egg, if reared and developed into a breeding adult, can fetch up to $20,000-$30,000. Small wonder authorities claim wildlife smuggling is the world's third largest illegal trade behind drugs and guns.
The reality is that not all the eggs will remain intact so the ultimate payoff may not be quite that big. But, after Fourie was stopped at the airport and his avian payload discovered, he was fined $20,000 for possession of unauthorised goods, for making a false declaration and for trading in threatened species.
Parrots, particularly exotic species, and lizards are the most trafficked live items in New Zealand. Controls are strict because of the bio-security risk - disease could wreak havoc among the poultry industry and native birds, among others - and because trading in wildlife helps hasten the graduation from threatened species to extinction.
Not that the smugglers pay too much attention. Interpol figures for the illegal global trade put the market at up to $10bn, including animals collected for menus or for traditional medicines in places like Asia. With the legitimate worldwide trade in wildlife currently at US$30bn, that means illegal trade accounts for up to a third of all wildlife transactions.
That's big money and there are signs, even outside Fourie's arrival here, that New Zealand is becoming a bigger market. While there are no national figures to compare against Interpol's global statistics, it was noted by New Zealand authorities that Fourie's appeared to be a professionally organised shipment.
Colin Hitchcock, a senior investigator with the Wildlife Enforcement Group (a joint venture between the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry, the Department of Conservation and Customs), says illegal importing is becoming more prevalent.
"It is done for two reasons - for lucrative financial gain, probably the major reason - and by enthusiasts," says Greg Reid, Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry investigations manager.
The enthusiasts are, perversely, animal lovers. Some are breeders who love elements like the colouration and the sheer exoticism of the animals they buy.
"It's an entrenched, well-established community who love the birds and the lizards and who may have a hankering to breed them and produce mutations and new plumage, for example," says Reid.
"Some are people with disposable income who tend to be collectors who like to buy and trade and work their way up the ladder, like commodity trading."
Birds and lizards are favoured because they are easier to transport. In the bird world, the trend is for macaws, cockatoos, parakeets and colourful finches while lizards include green iguanas, monitor lizards, bearded dragons and other exotic species.
African grey parrots are prized because they are intelligent and good talkers - one made world headlines in 2004 as it had a vocabulary of nearly 1000 words. Just last week, a shipment of 500 African greys was found being exported from Ghana - worth over $500,000.
For the striking hyacinth macaw, a huge parrot with a wingspan of up to 1.5m and a native of South America; coloured a magnificent hyacinth blue with gold eye rings and cheeks; a collector could expect to pay up to US$12,000 ($16,000). Closer to home, the rare Australian black cockatoo (which may not be kept as a pet even in Australia) is said to be worth $30,000 and double that in the US.
Of course, the removal of highly-sought birds from the wild exacerbates their status as endangered species - and makes them more expensive. However, the hyacinth macaw, while remaining on the endangered species list, has made a bit of a comeback in recent times, thanks to conservation efforts in Brazil in particular.
If you look at Mike and Pam Judd's eclectus parrot, you begin to understand the attraction for some owners.
Eclectus have brilliant colouring. The female of this sub-species has mauve and red plumage with a black beak. The male has green, red and blue plumage and a yellow beak. They are worth about $3000.
The Judds' parrot was born in New Zealand. They are quiet birds, good talkers and do not possess the paralysing screech of some parrots - the sulphur-crested cockatoo, for example, makes a screaming noise like a man with a megaphone being murdered.
Mike is a bird lover and has kept them for many years, graduating from budgies to finches to eclectus. He offers a clue as to why some collectors are keen to pay so much for new birds.
"The problem with parrots, in New Zealand and worldwide, is that the birds already in the country will have come from birds who have been bred three, four or even five times. That means there is a fair amount of inter-breeding going on; you can't avoid it. The birds are therefore getting further and further away from the real thing.
"If there is no new stock, no new blood, over a number of years the inter-breeding tends to diminish vital factors like appearance, colour, size and longevity."
So while the smugglers are in it for a buck, the collectors are seeking to re-create the aura of the wild. In doing so, of course, they can damage the very thing they covet and Judd agrees that New Zealand needs controls.
"We have to have the legislation, of course we do. Otherwise, it'd be open slather and there'd be no birds left anywhere - and there'd be a bio-security risk too."
Not everyone agrees. Another breeder says there is no reason why the illegal trade can't be legalised.
"If they did that, it would knock all this smuggling stuff on the head," he says. "They can bring in chook eggs and that's all controlled, so why not bring in other eggs and control that?"
This breeder, however, does not want his name used. Not because he is connected to any illegal trading - he says he wouldn't touch it with a barge pole - but because he has had valuable and specific parrots stolen, because of their rarity and value.
He doesn't advertise any more and prefers to keep his head down. He owns a couple of macaws and was exposed to the illegal market here when he was looking for rare hyacinth macaws a few years back.
"I was contacted by this guy who'd heard that I was looking for them and he said he could bring in whatever I wanted. In return, I had to get him 30 kaka eggs."
The breeder declined. The black market will flourish, he says, because people can see money-making opportunities, just like drugs.
Interestingly, there is little evidence of New Zealand native species being involved. While their rarity is attractive, our parrots tend to be a little drab in comparison with tropical species - and they are heavily protected.
However, Hitchcock says the same is not true of New Zealand lizards - like the little native geckos which attract a premium because of their rarity; their colouration and the fact that, unlike most lizards, they bear live young instead of eggs, making them a highly collectable item.
Speaking of smuggling "exports", it is entirely possible that not all of Fourie's shipment was destined for New Zealand backyard aviaries. All the authorities spoken to in researching this story talked about "laundering" animals in New Zealand.
Laundering a parrot seems a concept worthy of John Cleese and Monty Python but it is brought about, ironically, by New Zealand's laws which place the burden of proof on the authorities - as opposed to drug laws, for example, which plants that burden firmly on those discovered with drugs.
Our wildlife authorities, even if presented with an example of a species obviously imported, have to prove that the specific bird or lizard was not born here.
That's the problem. More than 20 or 30 years ago, there were fewer controls and some exotic species were imported into New Zealand in those freer times. Many have bred and such animals are no bio-security risk and are here quite legitimately.
So wildlife authorities have to prove that a parrot or lizard has been imported - and the trail can be hard to find and to follow.
That very loophole makes New Zealand an attractive place for smugglers. If they can get the bird or lizard in, New Zealand's strict laws invest the animal with an even greater value - as collectors know it is coming from a "clean" place and is carrying no disease requiring costly remedies or which may shorten its life and/or bring trouble from authorities.
But Hitchcock says his group has noticed a trend away from New Zealand as a staging post and towards wildlife being bought to stay in the country. "Some, in more recent times, have been remaining here. We haven't had quite so many that we know are destined for somewhere else."
Hitchcock, like every other enforcement officer spoken to, declined to talk specific values for smuggled animals.
For good reason: "If I did, it would simply attract a harder criminal element who might work out the money that is available and the fact that the penalties can be comparatively insignificant."
As in Fourie's case, the financial penalties can be outweighed by the potential gain. The law does cater for jail terms of up to five years but the record is three years - and that for a serial recidivist.
"It's a major issue for us," says Reid. "We are an island nation and responding quickly is not easy. We do not have an impervious border and there are a lot of entry opportunities."
His people work through tried and tested intelligence techniques rather than trying to cover New Zealand's vast coastlines but, as he says, "once they [the wildlife] are in, it's a lot more difficult for us from a procedural and legislative point of view." Hitchcock says of illegal importers: "They realise the limitations that we work under and they use it to their advantage."
Medium or rare parrot, sir?
Not everyone trafficks in wildlife to satisfy the demand for exotic pets. The trade in animal parts, such as bear bile and certain portions of a tiger for traditional Chinese medicines, is well known - and the menu also plays a role.
Two years ago, in India, a shipment of 2000 Rodrigue parakeets was intercepted en route to Nepal, where they are a special dish enjoyed by Chinese tourists.
But it is in live birds that the real money lies. In 2000, a 61-year-old British man was jailed for more than two years for smuggling two Lear's macaws to the UK. Their price; a whopping $150,000 a pair - as the birds then were down to the last 140 on the planet.
They are still critically endangered, although numbers are up to 750, but the case shows the crucial link between rarity and the amount of money to be made.
In a 1995 case, two American smugglers were sentenced to five years and a little under four years for taking US$1m worth of eggs of protected species from Australia illegally into the US.
Included were eggs of the black cockatoo which were, even then, selling for about $15,000. The smugglers visited Australia during the breeding season, stole the eggs and took them home in vests like that worn by Pillipus Fourie.
Meanwhile, Australian enforcement agencies are suspicious that organised crime - specifically, bikie gangs - are directing the illegal trade.
At an Adelaide conference last week, Interpol's visiting wildlife manager, Peter Younger, said law enforcers and regulators had to work more closely with each other.
Australia's national manager of investigations, Richard Janeczko, said Adelaide had a "very strong" bikie culture.
"We've found quite often there's a bikie connection to any animals that are dangerous, like snakes and scorpions, things with that macho kind of image," he said. "Whether or not bikies are involved in actual smuggling, they are usually the ones on the market."
