The illegal theft of old trees threatens China’s ecological and cultural heritage. Despite legal protections, their high-value timber has persistently fuelled illicit trade driven by economic incentives and weak enforcement in remote areas, endangering biodiversity and cultural traditions. This Comment article proposes comprehensive and alternative approaches to combat the illegal theft of old trees by advocating for a strengthened legal framework, enhanced monitoring systems and increased support for local authorities. It highlights the importance of public awareness and community engagement in conservation efforts to address the ingrained economic drivers of this illegal trade.

The modern antiquities market uses radiocarbon (14C) dating to screen for forged objects. Although this fact shows the potential and power of the method, the circumstances where it is applied can be questionable and call for our attention. Here we present an outline of a call to radiocarbon laboratories for due diligence and best practice approaches to the analysis of antique objects requested by non-research clients.

Agricultural and wildlife trade is subject to sudden, disruptive import restrictions arising from concerns over sanitary and phytosanitary safety and the conservation of natural resources. These restrictions can create significant international price differences that encourage the smuggling of goods across borders. This article presents an equilibrium model of smuggling where the supply and demand for smuggled goods depend on interregional price disparities in the presence of a trade ban. In this model, smuggling is more prevalent when demand and supply among trade partners is more inelastic or when there are fewer total trade partners at the time a trade ban is enacted. Applications are presented for regionalization, destruction of goods in government eradication programs, price support, stockpiling, and the development of substitutes. Regionalization may increase smuggling under certain production and consumption patterns.

The looting of archaeological and ethnographic objects from emerging countries and areas of conflict has prospered due to the high prices that these objects can achieve on the art market. This commercial value now almost necessarily requires proof of authenticity by the object’s age. To do so, absolute dating has been conducted since the end of the 1970s on terra cotta art objects using the thermoluminescence method, a practice that has since been condemned. It is only more recently, since the 2000s, that art dealers and collectors have begun to use the accelerator mass spectrometry (AMS) method to date different kinds of objects made of organic materials. Compared to conventional radiocarbon dating, the AMS technique requires only very small samples, thus depreciating neither the aesthetics nor commercial value of the object. As a result, the use of absolute dating has become widespread, accompanying the increase in looting of the cultural heritage of countries destabilized by political overthrows and armed conflicts, especially in the Near East and Africa. The present article condemns the practice of AMS dating of looted art objects and encourages the creation of a code of deontology for 14C dating laboratories in order to enhance an ethical approach in this sensitive field facing the current challenges.

Academic developments, migration and other forces of globalization have ruptured the validity of traditional national and ethnic archaeology in the Scandinavian states. However, this does not mean that the relationship between nation states and archaeology has come to an end. In reference to Norway, this article contends that on a practical level there is no viable alternative to replace the nation state. In terms of archaeological narratives, it is more relevant to adapt archaeological narratives to the evolving state than to advocate abandoning the nation state altogether.

Until recently the UK was notorious for its illicit market in unlawfully removed art and antiquities from around the globe. Today the UK marketplace is operating in a very different climate. The UK has recently become a state party to the 1970 UNESCO Convention and is now introducing a package of measures designed to strengthen its treaty obligations, central to which is the creation of a new criminal offence of dishonestly dealing in cultural objects unlawfully removed anywhere in the world. These also include the development of effective tools to aid enforcement and due-diligence. Recent events in Iraq have also forced the UK Government to announce its intention to ratify the 1954 Hague Convention.