NO leopard hunting will take place in South Africa in 2016 as the Department of Environmental Affairs (DEA) has withheld the quota and hunting licenses will not be issued.
‘Provincial conservation authorities were informed that leopard hunts should not be authorised in 2016,’ the Department of Environmental Affairs said, adding that the ban would be reviewed at the end of the year.
The department said it was acting on recommendations from South Africa’s Scientific Authority, which had suggested an intervention to ensure the survival of the leopard population.
Under the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES), South Africa can allocate 150 permits each year for the trophy-hunting of leopards destined for export.
The size of South Africa’s leopard population remains a mystery.
Conservation groups hailed the year-long ban, saying it was crucial to protecting the species given that the size of the population is unknown.
Kelly Marnewick, the Environmental Wildlife Trust’s carnivore conservation manager, supported the ban.
‘It’s important to ensure that any wildlife trade we do is sustainable.
‘If we can’t do that, it’s highly problematical, we need a trade ban until we can get to that.
‘Record keeping on trophy hunting in this country is shocking.
‘We haven’t been recording age, sex or size of trophies. If our hunting fraternity is serious about using wildlife sustainably they will embrace this ban and find ways to work with government until trade is sustainable,’ she said.
The mismanagement of trophy hunting and the illegal trade in leopard fur are the main threats to South Africa’s population of the big cat, according to the government.
South Africa earns substantial revenues from selling permits to wealthy foreigners willing to pay thousands, or even tens of thousands, of dollars to hunt one of the ‘big five’ (lion, leopard, elephant, rhino or buffalo).