It’s World Rhino Day on Sunday, and the world rhino population is in a state of crisis. As ever. Their habitat is being destroyed and every year many are illegally killed for the high prices fetched by their horns. And yet, in some ways rhinos are doing better than they have for years. Populations of both African species are rising – since 2021, blacks are up 4.2 per cent and whites are up 5.6 per cent; the first increase for whites since 2012. These increases are down to good management and greater success against poachers.
There are five living species of rhinoceros:
- Sumatran rhino: found on Sumatra and Borneo, population between 34 and 47
- Javan rhino: three locations on Java, population 50
- Black rhino: East and Southern Africa, 6,421
- White rhino: Eastern and Southern Africa, 17,464
- Greater one-horned rhino: India and Nepal, 4,016.
The two Indonesian species are particularly threatened by rising human population and consequent habitat destruction – as well as poaching. A gang recently admitted poaching 26 rhinos (for their horns) from Ulong Kulon National Park on Java. In South Africa between 2013 and 2017 rhino poaching continued at more than 1,000 a year. Last year the figure was 499; 10 per cent up on the previous year.
Contrary to modern myth, Rhino horn is not an aphrodisiac in traditional Chinese medicine. It’s used to treat fever, arthritis and nosebleeds; also to prevent stroke. Rhino horn, like your fingernails, is made from agglutinated hair. No health benefit has been found in scientific trials. A spike in demand from Vietnam over the last two decades reflects new prosperity. Here possession of rhino horn is a status symbol, and it’s used to treat cancer and hangover.
In many parts of Africa, habitat destruction is not the main problem for rhinos; something of a distinction in wildlife conservation in the 21st century. South Luangwa National Park in Zambia is 90,050 square kilometres and once held 4,000 black rhinos, a species that prefers wooded savannah to more open habitats. They were all poached out by the mid-1980s. Though the habitat is in good shape, rhinos were declared extinct in Zambia in 1998.
Even restricting the idea of wealth to mere money, calculations show that a living rhino is more valuable than a dead one, not least because income generated by wildlife tourism (a big employer) reaches local communities. It’s estimated that poaching problems cost the South African tourist industry up to €230 million between 2006 and 2014. A scientific paper calculates that “non-consumptive” exploitation of a single rhino generates 50 per cent more income than “consumptive” use.
Trophy hunting for rhino continues in Namibia and South Africa. It costs at least US$125,000 to shoot a white rhino; in 2015 an American hunter very publicly paid $350,000 to shoot a black rhino in Namibia. Conservation organisations agree, with varying degrees of reluctance, that money from hunting can be helpful to rhino conservation. The UK-based Save the Rhino charity doesn’t accept donations associated with trophy-hunting.
But let’s savour some good news.
As well as the African species, the greater one-horned rhino of India and Nepal is also increasing. In 1900 the population was down to 100 or so, the British Raj having an unappeasable shooting culture. Since then national parks have protected rhino habitat and good policing has kept poaching down. The population is up 1,500 from 2006.
In Zambia the North Luangwa Conservation Programme introduced 27 black rhinos to North Luangwa National Park between 2003 and 2018: a place with perfect black rhino habitat but no rhinos. The population is now between 50 and 100. None has yet been poached.
(Simon Barnes is a patron of Save the Rhino.)
