PRETORIUSKOP – South Africa is protecting just over 93% of Africa’s wild white rhino. When poaching started to increase dramatically in 2008, 83 rhino were poached in the Kruger National Park (KNP) that year. Numbers have climbed steadily to a worrying number, and are still on the increase.
The illegal trade in rhino horn for medicinal use is growing, and is mainly syndicate-based. In 2012, 267 alleged poachers were arrested. As of December last year, the total number of rhino poached in the park had increased by 42,6 per cent to a total of 1 004. This year 83 have already been lost. At this rate, the animal could be extinct by 2018.
To read the minister of environmental affairs, Ms Edna Molewa’s reaction to these facts, see Tuesday’s Lowvelder (March 11).
