“Reflections on the Conservation and Management of rhino in South Africa”

Dear Rhino Friends,

The ongoing debate on whether dehorning our Rhino and retailing the horn is the answer continues…and in the meantime the poaching continues as well. We would like to raise a few points to ponder - but not for too long as we have very little precious time left for our Rhino - on the consideration of legalizing Rhino horn:

1.   There is a large support for educating the Chinese regarding the medicinal values of Rhino horn – but the Chinese are not going to stop buying Rhino horn, no matter what anyone says or does. Consider spending $1Billion on this education process in an attempt to change the Chinese’s minds on Rhino horn. This will equate to less than $1 per Chinaman as there are more  than a billion of them, and will not even begin to address the Vietnamese, the Korean, the Indian, the Yamane’s, the Thai or any of the other potential users. In other words you stand zero chance of killing the massive demand for Rhino horn.

2.   This demand has no legal source of Rhino horn, so the consumer will buy indiscriminately from illegal sources regardless. But if we could create a sustainable, controllable and legal supply for the demand surely this would be the preferred market.

3.   We now know that if we stop issuing permits, or put White Rhino onto CITES 1, we will simply increase the illegal dealing and poaching. This has statically been proven by Dr. Richard Emslie’s presentation at the last Rhino Summit – “Reflections on the Conservation and Management of Rhino in South Africa”.

4.   Poaching and illegal dealers are indiscriminate in killing Rhino whereas at least the issuing of permits (whether for hunting or export) mostly passes the death sentence on surplus male Rhino. These poachers will kill off pregnant females or females with a calf at foot that is, as a result, orphaned and left for dead, but when controlled by farmers and permit hunting this can be prevented.

5.   These male Rhino are probably killed at an average age of 10 -12 years when hunted legally, not even mentioning the illegal and poached ones. If they could be kept alive, producing approximately 1kg of Rhino horn per annum for the next thirty years, they could again be part of the plan to create a sustainable, controllable and legal supply for the demand. And as confirmed by many Game Veterinarians, the Rhino’s horn can be removed under general anaesthetic; during the 18 minutes that the Rhino is anesthetized, the horn can be removed and the Rhino be treated for ticks and fleas, etc., and immediately thereafter be fully awake, and grazing – with no ill-effect to the Rhino.

6.   No farmer will ever want to kill his Rhino - legally, illegally or any other way - if he can sustainably sell his Rhino horn. The animal will be worth more to everybody alive than dead!

     In conclusion - the possibility that Rhino horn is ineffective for what it may be used for is irrelevant. The urgency and importance is that we need to stop the slaughter of our Rhino, as if we do not they WILL become extinct.

GIVE THEM THE HORN WITHOUT KILLING OUR RHINO!

We need our rhino livestock to stay in Southern Africa!

In our last Blog entry we voiced our concern about the government revoking export permits for live rhino – mentioning that this was the last incentive for our private rhino farmers to stay in business.

The reaction to this was “Why would we even consider exporting our precious rhino to foreign countries?”

We could not agree more: We need our rhino livestock to stay in Southern Africa and increase breeding numbers, therefore exporting is by far not the ideal choice.

But if it was possible for a free market situation where the private rhino farmers in Southern Africa were receiving the same amount of money for their horn production as their counter parts in China or if the rhino farming sector was a healthy industry with options to sell progeny to other Southern African farmers, no farmer in SA would want to export his rhino.

This is unfortunately not the case and in the meantime the private rhino farmer in Southern Africa has virtually no other legal income from his rhino production, other than hunting and killing the rhino. Exporting was the only option to create a legal income for the private rhino farmer.

Knowing that the rhino will not be poached in China when exported, and that the horn produced by them will go into the market and possibly save some rhino lives in Africa, exporting the live rhino seems like the better option currently. Hopefully the person buying the horn produced in China will buy less from iligal poachers.

But again, we would like to state that the ideal situation would be for us to keep our live rhino and their progeny in Southern Africa. Let’s supply the market ourselves and be sustainable rhino breeding farmers, having our rhino’s best interest at heart!

NO MORE LIVE EXPORTING OF RHINO

Why do our Nature Conservation Authorities prosecute the farmers and the veterinarians instead of the actual brutal poachers out there that are slaughtering our precious animals?
We have voiced our pleas to change legislation regarding trade in rhino horn, with two major motivations – 1. Supplying a demand and a market in an attempt to bring down the devastating numbers poached and, yes 2. To incentivize the rhino breeding farmer to breed with these lovely animals.
As a result, not only have the farmers and the vets been legally prosecuted and bullied on technicalities, permits and paperwork; fined and forced to pay thousands of rands for permits and licenses been excluded from government ‘public’ rhino summits - where important decisions are made on our rhino’s future - but now the only incentive left to the breeding farmers has also been revoked – NO MORE LIVE EXPORTING OF RHINO.
A live 2-2,5 year old rhino could be sold from the farmer to an exporter for roughly R150,000 to R180,000 (local buyers aren’t prepared to pay more than R120,000). This was a sustainable income to build and finance breeding projects and thereby provide a business opportunity and incentive for the existing and up-and-coming rhino breeding farmers. Breeding farmers are an important key in the longevity of our rhino in increasing the numbers, as elaborated in previous blogs.
Thus the breeding farmer cannot sell the rhino horn (regardless if the animal died or if the horn was harvested from a live rhino) or sell the live progeny! And therefore the only possible means left to earn currency for the rhino breeding farmers is hunting, KILLING our rhino regardless if it is a male or female!
For the non-conservation rhino farmers this is not necessarily a loss, for a hunted rhino (Bull or Cow) is measured by the size of its horn and for an average 4 year old rhino (purchased at R120,000 at 2 years old) can easily be hunted for approximately R300,000. This proves to be a lot more profitable and possible than breeding, and we are losing important numbers in our rhino community.
So again, instead of joining hands in conservation and agriculture, the conservationists are calling halt to all possible means for non-killing agricultural survival and so making it almost impossible to breed with rhino, legally that is.
The farmers are left with their backs against the wall, so either they hunt them and survive or they become corrupt?
Again our questions persist – should we not join hands as conservationists and farmers and make this a venture that results in a win-win situation of having rhino for our grandchildren and sustainable farmers to breed and ensure this longevity of our precious species!