Rhino Numbers Up in India

The link below is to an article that indicates good news from India, with Rhino numbers rising.

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China’s legalisation of rhino horn trade: disaster or opportunity?

Hubert Cheung, The University of Queensland; Duan Biggs, Griffith University, and Yifu Wang, University of Cambridge

The Chinese government will be reopening the nation’s domestic rhino horn trade, overturning a ban that has stood since 1993. An outcry since the announcement has led to the postponement of the lifting of the ban, which currently remains in place.

Read more:
The case for introducing rhinos to Australia

The directive, if instituted, would require that rhino horn be sourced sustainably from farmed animals and that its use is limited to traditional Chinese medicine, scientific and medical research, preserving antique cultural artefacts, and as educational materials.

The announcement has been widely condemned. The United Nations Environmental Program called it “alarming”. But done carefully and correctly, and with necessary international consultation, it doesn’t have to add to the threat to rhinos. Indeed, it could even support rhino conservation.

A legal trade of rhino horns, as seen here, could ensure income goes to legitimate conservation efforts as opposed to criminals.
Paul Fleet/Shutterstock

Rhino horns regrow and can be sustainably and humanely harvested from live animals. Those arguing for legalisation say that a well-regulated trade could be a source of funding for expensive rhino conservation. It could also help reduce poverty and support development around protected areas.

A legal trade could also provide an alternative supply of horns, where income goes to legitimate conservation and development efforts, rather than to criminals, which is currently the case.

Rhino horn for medicinal use

The directive from Beijing stipulates that rhino horn for medicinal use must come from rhinos bred specifically outside of zoos (such as at dedicated horn-farming facilities). The ground-up horn powder would then be certified under a scheme developed by a coalition of Chinese regulatory agencies.

These agencies should draw from China’s experience regulating the medicinal use of pangolin scales to make sure poached horn does not infiltrate the legal marketplace. Though strictly controlled since 2008, illegal pangolin products continue to be seized frequently throughout China.

According to the directive, the medicinal use of rhino horn will be restricted to treating urgent, serious and rare diseases. This is consistent with what traditional Chinese medicine practitioners see as the appropriate application of rhino horn. Strict guides for clinical application will be needed to prevent misuse and overuse, particularly given the length of time that rhino horn has been unavailable to law-abiding clinicians.

Existing rhino horn stocks

Beyond medicine, the directive stipulates that people who already own horns will be able to declare their stocks. The government will then issue identification and certification records. After this, the horns must be sealed and stored safely, and not traded under any circumstances, barring gift-giving and inheritance.

This part of the directive is particularly concerning, as such a scheme will be complex, potentially giving owners of poached rhino horns smuggled into China a get-out-of-jail-free card. Lessons should be learned from the ivory trade in Hong Kong, where poached ivory has been laundered into legal stocks thanks to inadequate record-keeping and lax enforcement.

This section of the directive also raises concerns about the development of a socially accepted practice of gifting rhino horn akin to that of Vietnam. There, rhino horn has been found to be given as a gift for terminally ill family members and in business settings, where horns are offered as bribes to government officials. Strict enforcement will essential if China is to make sure illegal trading under the guise of gifts is not to spread.

China will have to work with countries where the rhinos live in Asia and Africa.
Kevin Folk/Unsplash

Working with China

China will have to work with countries where rhinos live, including range states in both Asia and in Africa, as well as other rhino conservation stakeholders around the world. Swaziland and South Africa have previously proposed legalising the international trade in horn as a mechanism to fund and bolster conservation efforts.

Domestic trade in horn is legal in South Africa, and China and South Africa will have to coordinate to make sure their domestic marketplaces support rhino conservation and don’t enable transnational laundering and trade.

Beijing’s decision has certainly attracted immediate and fierce criticism from some conservation and animal welfare organisations. This criticism is exacerbated by different moral perspectives. Some people see the sale and consumption of rhino horn to fund conservation as morally repulsive. For others, it is legitimate and pragmatic.

Whichever side of the debate you stand on, the priority should be conservation outcomes and making sure that China’s newly legalised domestic horn trade strengthens rather than dangerously undermines rhino protection efforts. Rhino conservationists will need to find common ground with Beijing. This requires an appreciation of different cultural and moral values, and the use of evidence on how to minimise risks to rhino under the directive.

Responding to the widespread criticism, Chinese officials clarified that the implementation of the directive will be postponed. The government has also launched a short-term enforcement drive against illegal trading of rhino horn, which will run until the end of the year.

While heightened enforcement actions are welcome, it indicates that China can do much more to tackle illegal wildlife trade. China must strictly enforce its own regulations once its domestic horn trade has been opened.

Read more:
The northern white rhino should not be brought back to life

Postponing implementation gives Beijing time to develop a detailed and robust set of regulations. Now is the time for rhino range states, conservation scientists and concerned groups around the world to work with Beijing so that the impending domestic horn trade in China can be a positive for rhino conservation.The Conversation

Hubert Cheung, PhD Candidate in Conservation Biology, The University of Queensland; Duan Biggs, Senior Research Fellow Social-Ecological Systems & Resilience, Griffith University, and Yifu Wang, PhD Candidate, Department of Geography, University of Cambridge


The case for introducing rhinos to Australia

File 20180714 27015 1j06axb.jpg?ixlib=rb 1.1
Australia could sustain wild rhinos, but should it try?
Renaud Fulconis/International Rhino Foundation, Author provided

Bill Laurance, James Cook University

Rhinos in Australia might seem like an insane proposition – after all, we’ve had historically bad luck with introduced species. But on reflection it’s not quite as crazy as it sounds.

There are five species of rhinoceros in the world: two in Africa and three in Asia.

The world of all five species is being rapidly destroyed and shredded, their savanna and forest habitats sliced apart by clearings, fences, roads, and other obstructions.

Read more:
Hybrid embryos raise hope of resurrecting northern white rhino – but what’s the point?

Even worse, they are being slaughtered by armed poachers for their valuable rhino horn, which is falsely thought to have aphrodisiac or curative properties, for maladies ranging from hangovers to cancer.

Vietnam and China are overwhelmingly the biggest consumers of rhino horn. Chinese citizens and even diplomats working in Africa and Asia have reportedly engaged in the illegal smuggling of rhino horn and other wildlife products.

Collapsing populations

Rhinos are relicts of a great megafauna that until recently dominated the planet. Today, they are some of the most endangered animals on Earth.

Read more:
Rhino fossil rewrites the earliest human history of the Philippines

For instance, the Sumatran Rhinoceros is so rare that biologists refuse to disclose where it still lives, to avoid tipping off poachers – beyond confirming it persists in small pockets of northern Sumatra, Indonesia.

The Sumatran Rhino, the most primitive rhino species, is a denizen of dense rainforests.
Bill Konstant/International Rhino Foundation

The Javan Rhinoceros was once the most abundant rhino species in Asia, ranging from Southeast Asia to India and China. But today it is one of the rarest mammals on Earth, with just 60 animals surviving in far western Java, Indonesia.

Read more:
Saving Javan rhinos from extinction starts with counting them – and it’s not easy

In Africa, White Rhinos and Black Rhinos are having mixed fortunes – but mostly bad.

The Black Rhino was once widely distributed across eastern and southern Africa, but its numbers have dramatically fallen and nearly half of its unique subspecies have vanished.

The White Rhino has two distinct subspecies. The southern subspecies collapsed to just 20 individuals a century ago, but with dedicated protection it has made an astounding comeback – to around 20,000 animals today, by far the most numerous of all rhinos.

A White Rhino from southern Africa.

But the northern White Rhino is virtually gone. The last male died on March 19, and only two females are alive in captivity.

In recent weeks scientists have used frozen sperm and harvested eggs to create a few test-tube embryos, which they hope to implant into a southern female in a last-ditch effort to stave off the northern subspecies’ demise.

Read more:
Even if you were the last rhino on Earth… why populations can’t be saved by a single breeding pair

Fatal circumstances

All of this means that most of the nations with rhino populations are having profound difficulties maintaining them. Not that it’s easy. Rhinos are big, near-sighted, and rather predictable in their habits – easy prey for poachers.

They live in developing nations with many impoverished people, where lethal weapons are frighteningly common and the rule of law is precarious.

And they have horns worth up to US$300,000 each.

In efforts to staunch the slaughter, some nations are de-horning their rhinos, or assigning guards to watch over them day and night, like heavily armed sheep herders.

Proliferating roads are slicing into rhino habitats, increasing access for poachers.

South Africa is even treating rhino-horn powder with powerful poisons to help scare off illicit consumers.

Lynn Johnson, an enterprising Melbourne businesswoman, has raised tens of thousands of dollars to place ads in Vietnamese magazines and newspapers, warning about the poisons and decrying the rhino slaughter.

Read more:
Why allowing the sale of horn stockpiles is a setback for rhinos in the wild

Such measures are certainly helping, but it’s a fraught battle. Roads are proliferating dramatically in developing nations, increasing access to ecosystems for poachers. And human populations and the many pressures they bring are growing rapidly in Africa and Asia.

Some experts believe that captive breeding is the most viable near-term solution, especially for the distressingly rare Sumatran and Javan Rhinos. Maintaining them in zoos or breeding facilities keeps alive the hope that they might one day be reintroduced to the wild.

Captive breeding might be the last chance for some rhino species.

A crazy idea?

But why not introduce rhinos to Australia? Before you laugh out loud, consider this.

Australia has abundant savannas, woodlands and rainforests that the various species of rhinos need to survive. And rhinos are generalist grazers or browsers, meaning they are not especially picky about what they eat.

Read more:
EcoCheck: Australia’s vast, majestic northern savannas need more care

Australia has a strong rule of law and minimal wildlife poaching, with huge numbers of ecotourists who would surely be keen to see spectacular rhinos. One group, the Australian Rhino Project, is already trying to establish a White Rhino population in Australasia.

But while I might be crazy, I’m not stupid.

I am not suggesting that rhinos be allowed to roam free in Australia. Under such circumstances they could degrade native ecosystems and even pose a danger to people. Rather, rhinos should be contained in cattle stations or other enclosed areas.

And I am not suggesting that harbouring rhinos in Australia would mean reducing efforts to save them in the wild or conserve their crucial habitats.

Indeed, preserving rhinos without protecting their native ecosystems is like saving a few shiny baubles from Christmas, while throwing away the Christmas tree that held them.

An Indian One-horned Rhinoceros.

Rather, the idea would be to establish semi-wild or managed populations that could buffer rhinos against global extinction, and at the same time provide public education and raise money.

Any effort that failed to provide revenue to conserve wild rhinos and their native habitat – especially if it competed for funding with current conservation initiatives – would be a perverse and undesirable outcome.

Of course, when it comes down to it, introducing rhinos to Australia is a pretty wild idea. Maybe my tongue is in my cheek, and I’m just trying to get other tongues wagging about the desperate need for rhino conservation.

The ConversationBut whatever we do about rhinos, it’s clear that desperate times call for desperate measures.




Corey Bradshaw, Flinders University





No inbreeding, please


The Red List’s assessment criteria are based on the so-called “50/500 rule”. This states that to avoid inbreeding depression (the loss of “fitness” due to genetic problems), an effective population size of at least 50 individuals in a population is required.

To avoid eroding evolutionary potential (the ability of a population to evolve to cope with future environmental changes), an effective population of at least 500 is required.

The key here is that little qualifier “effective”. This refers to individuals who can breed with each other without causing inbreeding or loss of genetic diversity. A family unit, for example, might have only one or two reproductively effective members. But they would also need another, unrelated, family unit nearby for their offspring to reproduce with.

That means that the number of effective individuals is lower than the total population. On average, the ratio is about 0.1 to 0.2; that is, one effective individual (genetically speaking) for every five to ten members of the population.

This also assumes that the breeding pairs are matching up based on an optimal genetic basis – what geneticists call an “idealised population”.

In a perfect world, a breeding pair of animals would be completely unrelated and would have no chance of producing babies with any genetic defects caused by inbreeding. However, real populations rarely behave like this, so some pairs have a certain amount of relatedness. As the population gets smaller, the chance of breeding with a relative increases, which leads to more frequent and severe inbreeding.

Repopulating the world after the apocalypse

So let’s do the maths. Fifty effective individuals – the ICUN standard for avoiding inbreeding – equals a total population of 250 to 500. This means that, in a hypothetical apocalypse, humanity would need a lot more than a handful of survivors to repopulate effectively.

However, to retain evolutionary potential – to remain genetically flexible and diverse – the IUCN criteria suggest we would need at least 500 effective individuals. That requires a population of 2,500 to 5,000.

Some preliminary results emerging from ongoing research at the Centre of Excellence for Australian Biodiversity and Heritage appear to confirm this. Using both ancient DNA techniques and palaeo-demographic models, we have estimates of a minimum effective population size for Aboriginal Australians when they first appeared of about 250. This means at least several thousand had to arrive around the same time to manage to colonise the entire continent successfully.

Of course, not every species has the same ratio of effective to total population size, and not all populations necessarily need 5,000 individuals to survive. But without being able to measure the true ratio for a specific population, it helps to default to the average situation.

The idea that 50 individuals is enough to avoid inbreeding depression comes largely from laboratory populations that probably do not describe the situation for populations living in wild environments.

In species as varied as houseflies and pinkfairies, populations substantially greater than 50 individuals still succumb to inbreeding depression. So, in many cases, 50 effective individuals is in fact too low to ensure no inbreeding depression occurs. It may be that 100 effective individuals is closer to the true minimum, without even considering how populations respond to evolutionary challenges.

So, sensational analogies about the apocalypse aside, do human beings follow the same rule? We aren’t entirely sure, but evidence suggests that most species in vastly different groups roughly follow the same trend.

The ConversationAn emerging rule of thumb is that when a population starts to dip below several thousand individuals, it has a high likelihood of going extinct.

Corey Bradshaw, Matthew Flinders Fellow in Global Ecology, Flinders University


Rhinos should be conserved in Africa, not moved to Australia

Matt Hayward, Bangor University




Conservation cost















Matt Hayward, Senior Lecturer in Conservation, Bangor University


India’s militant rhino protectors are challenging traditional views of how conservation works

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Benedikt Saxler / shutterstock

Bhaskar Vira, University of Cambridge




1. The militarisation of conservation





2. The rights of local and indigenous populations


kongsak sumano



3. Can we keep expanding protected areas?







