Rhino have a unique gift to save themselves from this onslaught with a re-growing horn, yet we refuse to let them use it with our legislation and rules. If we do not do something now, our SA rhino will follow their cousins in the rest of Africa to an inevitable extinction. Dehorning regularly CAN save our rhino!
Get the word out there and prevent this disaster and help our rhino in their miserable plight.
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Having been involved in both the private wildlife ranching industry as well as the conservation sector for more than a decade, it is with dismay and alarm that I feel the need to share my five cents worth over the alarming increase in rhino poaching in the sub-region over the past 3 years.
ReplyDeleteRhino poaching in South Africa began to escalate at an alarming rate, and continues to do so, since the implementation of the Threatened and Protected Species regulations in 2007. Officials have called this coincidence, but looking at statistical graphs, the similarities to ‘cause and effect’ are much more apparent than coincidence. Up until the implementation of TOPS, and since the issuing of the first white rhino hunting permits in the late 1960’s, white rhino were prospering on private land in South Africa. Rhino (both black and white) were highly sort after game farm species, not only for their aesthetic value, but mainly for the financial incentives associated with owning them. Game farming or wildlife ranching, like any other farming or agricultural sector, is about rands and cents and ultimately, return on investment. Whilst many animal rightists, welfare organisations and uninformed members of the public may find the concept of “farming” with “wild” animals abhorrent, it is our forward thinking South African game farmers who have successfully created a value for many species by applying novel farming methods and agricultural principles to developing an industry in our country which is marginal for livestock production. The added spin-off of this industry is conservation of rare and endangered species and preservation of habitat which would have otherwise been destroyed by livestock or crop farming.
The value in species created by the wildlife ranching sector has had huge benefits for our conservation agencies who earn in excess of R100 million per annum through the sale of live animals to the private sector. The bulk of this sum of money comes from rhino sales. Were these transactions not to take place, this substantial amount of money would have to be realized by government or donor agencies in order for our conservation agencies to be able to continue with the wonderful work they do.
The financial incentives which drew private wildlife ranchers into owning rhino have all but disappeared. Rhino poaching is increasing daily, it is life-threatening to have anything that resembles a rhino on your property, the regulatory authorities have restricted the industry so much and so ineffectively that only once your paperwork weighs as much as your rhino are you able to do anything with them, and security for your rhino now costs more than they are worth. The end result being that most rhino owners want to get rid of their animals and would be rhino owners are far better off investing money in alternative species which they are able to utilize.
The most recent spate of rhino poaching incidents and horn thefts have one thing in common, they were either inside jobs or possible leakage of information from provincial permit offices. TOPS permits for rhino ownership, translocation, capture, treatment, dehorning and or hunting can take anywhere between four to 6 weeks to be issued and sometimes even longer. During this time a permit application form with all the private rancher’s details float around provincial offices for all and sundry to see, this includes physical addresses, number of rhino on property, number of horns in safe etc etc. and all the while, your rhino you purchased on live auction, has to remain standing in holding facilities where they are sitting ducks for poachers at your financial risk. How does the private sector ensure that their information is kept confidential and safely out of the reach of would be criminals?? How does an.... continued
industry which is worth billions of rands to the country function, when the menial task of issuing a permit to translocate a live animal takes 4 to 6 weeks and very often longer, to issue. Perhaps this would be tolerable were our regulatory authorities able to provide any meaningful information gleaned from this permit system, but how is this possible when the permit applicant has to provide the copies of each and every document issued by the regulatory authorities allowing you to own rhino, as they do not have them on file. We have 9 provinces, all of which, do not apply the same regulations, Mpumpulanga for instance (and this happens to be the most effective provincial authority) is to date still issuing TOPS permits, whilst most other provinces seem to interpret the regulations in different ways. Is it not time to centralize the permits, or even better, distinguish between wildlife ranching and conservation, and allow the ranchers to continue unhindered under the department of agriculture, as do the livestock farmers?? The wildlife ranching sector, were it given the opportunity to prosper through utilization, both consumptive and non-consumptive, is the one and only buffer which we have which will ensure the future survival of our rhino populations in protected areas.
ReplyDeleteThe age old cliché “if it pays it stays” is going to be particularly pertinent to rhino conservation decision makers in the very near future. It seems bizarre to me that private rhino owners, who have invested millions of rand on game farming land and animals seem to be left out of the decision making loop. The way I see the future for rhino conservation is one of two ways, either the penalties need to be so harsh that if you so much look at a rhino horn you spend the rest of your days in prison! However, if these penalties are only applicable to South Africa and not to countries where the demand for horn stems from, this will most certainly be an ineffective measure, and the likelihood of this happening in the east where they have been using rhino horn in medicines for the past 7000 years is all but miniscule. Added to that, implementing these types of penalties in a country where you are highly unlikely to spend your life behind bars even for rape and murder seems questionable. The alternative is legalising the trade in horn, and controlling it so that each and every horn is traceable to the farm of origin (possible with many other agricultural products), and allowing a market to develop where supply, demand and price balance each other out. Unfortunately there is no middle road, and whatever the decision may be it will have to be made quickly and implemented strictly otherwise most of us will see the rhino become extinct before the end of our lifetimes…..we seem to forget that between 1960 and 1990 approximately 100 000 rhino were poached on the African continent..we only have 20 000 and I cant see them lasting all that long if the situation carries on in the current vein.
Dr Andre Uys, Veterinarian