Rhino poaching: Making a case to permit the legal trade in horn

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Rhino poaching: Making a case to permit the legal trade in horn

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Opinionista • John Hanks • 28 June 2018

The only effective way to save the rhino is a legal and regulated sale in horn. Until that happens, governments will continue to flounder in their attempts to roll back transnational poaching syndicates and private protectors of the noble animal will be bled dry financially in their fight to save the species.

In the past 26 years, South African John Hume, aged 76, has bred 1,279 white rhinos on his private property, and is currently protecting 1,626 rhinos of which 300 are pregnant therefore making it 1,926 lives of rhinos in total.

He has been remarkably successful and has lost just 32 rhinos to poachers, compared with 7,048 rhinos poached in the whole of South Africa since the Moratorium on Domestic Trade in Rhino Horn, up to and including 2017.

In the four years before the imposition of the moratorium on February 13 2009, there was virtually no poaching. This is an outstanding contribution to the long-term security of the species, for which he deserves an enormous vote of thanks and appreciation from the international conservation community.

This success could not have been achieved without an unprecedented level of financial support, all of which has come from Hume’s life savings. Protecting rhinos in today’s world from increasing attacks by poaching gangs is an extremely expensive operation, as all the government conservation agencies in Africa know only too well.

In addition, the recent severe periods of drought in South Africa have necessitated supplementary feeding, which John has also had to do at a total cost for field protection, feeding, veterinary expenses, etc., of at least R5- million a month (US$400,000 @ R12.50 = $1), amounting to an annual expenditure of R60-million (US$4.8-million).

He has now reached the point where he can no longer continue as his life savings will be exhausted in August 2018. He is in urgent need of substantial financial support, as are other private land-owners, who together are responsible for about 7,000 rhinos (according to Pelham Jones, the chairman of the Private Rhino Owners Association) more than the rest of Africa combined.

An increasing number of these land-owners no longer want rhinos on their properties, because of these exorbitant costs and escalating security threats to their staff and families, and already the number of private rhino custodians has dropped from 400 in 2009 to 320 today.

There is an option open to Hume and others who have rhino on their properties, including government agencies, which should be discussed openly and objectively by conservation NGOs and all other organisations involved in rhino conservation, namely the advantages of a regular, sustainable and strictly controlled trade in rhino horn – horn that is sourced from healthy, live rhinos, with the income generated going back to those who have the responsibility of ensuring the long-term security of the species.

As background , the international trade in rhino horn was banned in 1977 by the UN Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (Cites).

It has been an unmitigated failure, and it has not saved the life of a single rhino, with no less than 23 out of 33 range states having lost all their rhino due to poaching.

The ban has spawned the growth of close to 400 NGOs raising and spending millions on campaigns and demonstrations to “save the rhino”, with yet more research and grants for projects that have made little or no difference to the security of the species.

There is a very strong case to be made for rejecting the ban and moving to a legal international trade. Since there has always been a demand for horn in South East Asian culture, why not accept this and endeavour to meet the demand rather than block it?

It’s only since trade was outlawed that rhino horn became globally recognised as the most valuable commodity, worth more than gold and cocaine, reaching up to $100,000 per kilogram on the black market.

A legal trade in rhino horn can help create a conservation incentive and generate substantial income for people like Hume.

At present, money from rhino horns collected in Africa go to the criminals and not the conservationists. South Africa can easily, and sustainably, satisfy current levels of demand (from stocks, natural deaths and private land-owners) without the need to kill one rhino.

So few people know that horns removed from an immobilised and tranquilised rhino is painless, and there is no evidence that removal impacts on its social life and ability to survive. Horns then regrow, up to 1 kg a year, and this regular harvesting could be done up to eight times in the animal’s life.

In summary, these are the advantages of a strictly controlled legal trade.

- Rhino horn supplied without killing a single animal.
By becoming active market participants, state reserves and private landowners with rhinos would be able to generate a substantial income from these animals, which are at present regarded as a massive financial burden.
- Rhino horn stockpiles held by conservation agencies and private landowners could be fed into the market, removing the high costs and security risks associated with maintaining them.
- A controlled legal trade should encourage other private landowners and local communities to obtain and maintain their own rhino populations, and to start breeding from them, thus increasing rhino numbers.
- If Far Eastern governments are invested in the legal trade, which they could be, they will close down the illegal trade.
- The simple message must be that with the sustainable use approach we will end up with many more rhinos AND economic opportunities for local communities.
- By imposing Western standards of strict preservation, we will end up with far fewer rhinos, crippling costs, aid dependence and significant habitat loss too.
- We need to ensure that every option possible is available to unlock the value of wildlife in rural areas.
- Due to the moratorium on legal trade in rhino horn, Hume has been deprived of an income since the ban was introduced, while bearing all the costs and expenses to keep rhinos safe from poachers, having no assistance or aid from government or numerous wildlife NGOs.

After failing to persuade the government to drop the moratorium which has only outlawed a regulated trade and created the monopoly for illegal traders, Hume took the government to court to drop the moratorium.

The battle took over four years until the case for rhinos was won in November 2015. The court ordered the government to lift the moratorium, automatically bringing back a strictly regulated domestic legal trade in harvested rhino horn, where a rhino stays alive and its horns grow back.

However, the South African government went on appealing for 18 months and lost all three appeals. On 5 April 2017 the Constitutional Court restored a regulated domestic trade in rhino horn in South Africa, but since then the government has effectively blocked any local sales, with a plethora of new rules and regulations which makes it virtually impossible for those who want to sell rhino horns to generate any income.

In 1997, South Africa put the proposal to Cites for dropping the international prohibition on trade in rhino horn and regulate global trade by legal sales. South Africa lost this proposal by just one vote.

In 2016, Swaziland also put the proposal to Cites for dropping the international prohibition on trade in rhino horn and allowing legal trade. When the vote on this took place, 100 countries voted against the legalisation, 26 supported the proposal, and 17 abstained.

The fact that among countries that supported Swaziland’s proposal were the majority of global rhino population custodians, namely South Africa, Namibia and Zimbabwe with 23,876 rhinos out of 28,066 (the world population), was outlooked by the Cites Secretariat.

As Thomas Sowell, an American economist and political commentator, said: “It is hard to imagine a more stupid or more dangerous way of making decisions than by putting those decisions in the hands of people who pay no price for being wrong.”

Also, by paraphrasing Sowell, we cannot ignore the fact that while prohibition sounds great and it has always sounded great, it is only when we go beyond rhetoric, and start looking at hard facts, that prohibition turns out to be a big disappointment, if not a disaster.

Hume believes that captive breeding projects are vital to help save rhinos from extinction and that rhinos could pay their own survival with a legal trade in rhino horn. However, until we change the law that currently benefits criminals we need your help to keep John Hume’s project alive and help his mission to save rhinos for future generations. DM

https://www.dailymaverick.co.za/opinion ... zS-utIzbIV


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Re: Rhino poaching: Making a case to permit the legal trade in horn

Post by Richprins »

I agree with most of this. I highly doubt Mr Hume is facing poverty, however, also that NGO's have made little or no difference! :shock:


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Re: Rhino poaching: Making a case to permit the legal trade in horn

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---------------------------------------------------GUEST COLUMN------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Legalising rhino horn trade the obvious answer to SA's poaching problems

2019-03-18 11:06

Those who are opposed to legal rhino horn trading either do not understand the realities of rhino conservation, or have a vested interest in rhino remaining endangered, writes Peter Oberem.

Seven hundred rhino murdered in one year can never be good news. Why must we accept the deaths of almost two rhino a day in South Africa alone when there is an answer? To my mind, and the minds of hundreds of conservationists and game ranchers, the solution is legalising rhino horn trade.

This step will restore the value of live rhino, and give honest users of rhino horn access to legal and sustainable products. As a result, humans and the natural environment alike will benefit from the continuation of South Africa's conservation success story.

Restoring the value of live rhino

South Africa is home to 79% of Africa's total rhino population, white and black, of around 25 600. When one adds the one-horn rhinoceros of India, the world has – at most – only 28 000 rhino of all species. Of this total population, almost a third are owned privately by game ranchers in South Africa. According to the newly released 2017 survey figures, 46% of all white rhino in South Africa (around 7 500 animals) are on private ranches.

Ours is one of the few countries in the world where game has commercial value, thanks to two pieces of legislation.

Firstly, the Game Theft Act, Act 105 of 1991, states that when wild animals are certified as adequately enclosed, their ownership is conferred from the state to the owner of the enclosed area. Based on this act, wild animals can be privately owned and, being owned, can be traded. This gives them a value and turns them into assets that the owner is prepared to protect and conserve.

Secondly, South Africa's Constitution enshrines the right to sustainably use the natural resources of the country.

The impact of this legal framework is evident in both the dramatic increase in the area under conservation in South Africa (approximately 20 million hectare, or 20% of formerly marginal and often degraded agricultural land, is now private game ranches), and in the increase of game in the country (from an estimated 500 000 in 1965 to almost 20 million today).

More specifically, in 1895 there were less than 60 southern white rhino in iMfolozi; by 1990, the government's conservation efforts had grown the number to approximately 6 000. The spike to the approximately 20 000 white rhino we have today, came with moving of some of the animals into private ownership once the law allowed it. Consider that during this same period, the number of rhino in the rest of Africa had declined by over 80%.

Sadly, these days wildlife ranchers keep rhino for love alone. One of the many terrible consequences of poaching, has been the destruction of the financial value of live rhino. It costs at least R28 000 per month for anti-poaching security. In addition, some ranchers feed their rhino every night to attract them away from the fences, and dehorn them every two years at a cost of R6 000 per animal. The removed horn needs a permit, which comes at a fee, and has to be stored safely where its presence is not a threat to life and limb of the owner. A secure vault can cost around R3 000 per month.

On top of these costs, the ability to earn money from owning rhino has all but been eliminated by bureaucracy. While selling horn locally is now legal, it is almost impossible to get the necessary permits from the Department of Environmental Affairs (DEA). International trade remains misguidedly banned by CITES.

As hunting is legal again (albeit very strictly controlled), the reality is that a dead, hunted rhino is now worth more than a live one.

The combined impact of massive costs and almost no returns, has seen the loss of more than 200 000ha of rhino-range-land since the ban on rhino hunting and horn sales in 2010.

Legalising horn trade will do much to restore the value of live rhino, as these figures show:

The current price of rhino horn on the streets of Vietnam and China is US$60 000/kg (approximately R900 000/kg). Under legal trading conditions, the Asian retailer could earn R300 000 for a kilogram of horn (one-third), with R600 000 coming back to South Africa. At a tax rate of 29%, the government gets R175 000 to channel towards conservation, leaving R425 000 for the wildlife rancher – ample funds to cover the costs associated with growing the kilogram of horn.

Legal trade makes considerable national economic sense. South Africa's 20 000 white rhino can produce 30 000kg of horn per year, providing R27bn income to the country. The government earns R7,8bn in taxes, leaving R19,2bn for the rhino owners.

The opportunity to earn an income from rhino, will encourage more game farmers to keep and breed the animals, thus increasing rhino numbers and areas under conservation.

Importantly, these benefits will not only accrue to government and private landowners. Communities that keep rhino on their communal land will benefit on equal terms. The R600 000 that one kilogram of legally traded rhino horn can yield, is equivalent to 17 jobs at the new minimum wage rate for farm workers.

Legal access for horn users

Rhino horn is a recognised ingredient in traditional Chinese medicine; a market for it is therefore a given. In a legalised trade environment, access will be controlled and because of a likely downward pressure on prices, practitioners will benefit from supporting legal traders instead of poachers.

Legal trade is easily controlled through DNA identification. Every horn that is removed is matched to the living rhino that was dehorned. This means that any bit of horn found anywhere in the world can be traced to it origin – provided it was legally dehorned and has been through the Rhodis process at the Faculty of Veterinary Science, Onderstepoort. Any horn not identifiable is poached horn, and its traders can be prosecuted.

The conclusion has to be that the demand for illegal horn will fall and eventually disappear altogether.

Is there enough legal horn?

The answer is an unequivocal yes.

A rhino grows 1kg to 1,5kg of horn per year. With 20 000 rhino, South Africa can produce almost 30 000kg (30 tonnes) per year. At the height of the poaching scourge, poachers killed 1 250 animals in South Africa with an average of 5kg horn each. This brings the annual demand to only 6,25 tonnes per year – far below our ability to produce horn for legal sales.

Most importantly, rhino are not harmed by dehorning – it really is like clipping your nails – and ranchers dehorn already in an attempt to prevent poaching.

One cannot but conclude that those who are opposed to legal rhino horn trading either do not understand the realities of rhino conservation, or have a vested interest in rhino remaining endangered. Furthermore, government bureaucracy is destroying the amazing conservation story begun with the wise men who put the right to sustainable use of our natural resources into our Constitution.

I therefore plead with our president, who I know understands this issue, to do the right thing for rhino conservation in particular and conservation in general, and for all current and future rhino owners, including those communities who live on deep rural communal lands.

Please, President Ramaphosa, put your and your government's weight behind lifting the ban on legal rhino horn trade and ensure that the bureaucrats stop strangling our future.

Maz'enethole – may your cows calve.

- Dr Peter Oberem is the owner of Dabchick Wildlife Reserve and managing director of Afrivet.


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Re: Rhino poaching: Making a case to permit the legal trade in horn

Post by Richprins »

This is well-argued. Pieter is very experienced and respected, too! Obviously the price of horn would drop a lot, but it would still remain sustainable. \O


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Re: Rhino poaching: Making a case to permit the legal trade in horn

Post by Flutterby »

But the end users are getting fussy...they want horns from wild rhinos, not farmed ones! 0*\


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Re: Rhino poaching: Making a case to permit the legal trade in horn

Post by Lisbeth »

How ignorant can one be? They are really naive 0*\ How can they ignore the facts known to everybody.....almost 0-


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Re: Rhino poaching: Making a case to permit the legal trade in horn

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Two speakers share their views on to trade or not to trade rhino horns
Colin Bell and John Hanks did not need much introduction for many of those present, since most of the audience were well acquainted with the issue.
22 hours ago

To trade or not to trade in rhino horn? This was the theme of an intense debate that took place between two prominent conservationists, nature lovers and Wessa members last Wednesday in the Penryn auditorium.

Colin Bell and Dr John Hanks did not need much introduction for many of those present, since most of the audience were well acquainted with the issue.

Hanks is a zoologist with a PhD from Cambridge on elephant population dynamics with 45 years of experience in applied conservation management and research projects in several African countries.




He is also well known in the safari business.
The debate was led by Dr Llew Taylor who explained that, “within Africa, the prevailing belief centres on pursuing responsible, sustainable trade in rhino products, but further afield the belief seems to significantly reduce demand, suggesting a complete ban on the trade”.

Hanks presented his view with a series of slides depicting how the loss of rhinos grew from 13 in 2007 to 769 in 2018, peaking with 1 215 in 2014. The wholesale price peaked in 2012 at $65 000 per kilogram.

Lately poachers received an average of $2 273 per kilogram.According to him rhino security costs about R2 billion per year, or R112 500 per animal.

“Financial support to keep that up gets more difficult since potential donors experience so-called donor fatigue,” he said.

Image

His support for legal trade is based on the fact that a rhino’s horn can regrow up to a kilogram in about 18 months; its removal while the animal is immobilised and tranquilised is painless, and there is no evidence to suggest that it impacts on the animal’s social life and ability to survive.
“The CITES trade ban has not worked but created an illegal market dominated by crime syndicates,” he said. “It essentially handed the monopoly to the black market with no compensation for rhino custodians.”
He asked whether, with China’s population of 1 419 000 000, that speaks
56 different dialects, the cultural beliefs in the Far East would ever be changed.

“Should we perhaps accept it and try to meet the demand legally? It could result in a substantial income for rhino owners instead of the animals just being a financial burden.”
He admitted that legal trade would not necessarily stop poaching, but should be part of a comprehensive plan.
Bell put more emphasis on the subjective, emotional value of rhinos. His message was short and clear: A total trade ban is needed. According to him, tourism was too important a source of income to be neglected and tourists want to see rhinos with horns.

He pleaded for better security and stricter law enforcement to curb poaching.

Using an extensive study on elephant poaching, he tried to prove that trade bans had a major influence on the decline in poaching.

According to him numbers of both black and white rhinos increased in 1993, when all countries implemented CITES regulations.
He suggested that the use of rhino products stopped and alleged that the use of rhino horn in traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) was then made illegal.

“It is a lie that rhino horn is used in TCM,” he said.
He also suggested that poaching increased since 2005, when South Africa got certain exemptions from CITES. “Criminal gangs took the loophole and poaching increased. They bought rhino horn legally and could launder it.

That was the origin of the current crisis.”
Questions from the audience centred on whether the demand would ever be met; how to stop the illegal trade and how to regulate legal trade; the moral issues around trade and research supporting both.

To conclude, the audience voted on the issue and it was in favour of legal trade.

https://lowvelder.co.za/479010/two-spea ... ino-horns/


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Re: Rhino poaching: Making a case to permit the legal trade in horn

Post by Lisbeth »

Honestly, I do not know.

1. If it is true that the end user do not want farmed horns then to legalize is no good.

2. If they will buy any horn and the prices go down, it would not be worth it to poach anymore and it would not be necessary to dehorn the wild animals.

If it is true that the Chinese and Vietnamese will never change and remain the ignorants they are on this subject, then maybe it would be better to legalize, but only if 1. is not true.

There are a lot of "IFs" here 0*\


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