New deal for black rhinos
28 October 2003
There's been good news recently for South Africa's shy, precarious black rhino population, with the finalisation of a multi-million rand partnership between Ezemvelo KZN Wildlife and international conservation organisation WWF.
The Black Rhino Range Expansion Project aims to increase the numbers of the critically endangered animals by increasing the land available for their conservation, thus reducing pressure on existing reserves and providing new territory in which they can breed quickly.
"We are looking for strategic partnerships with landholders within the species’ historic range, initially in KwaZulu-Natal and thereafter further afield," said Jacques Flamand of the World Wildlife Fund. "The landholders won't necessarily have been traditionally involved in conservation, and they could be from the private, community or state sectors."
A call for expressions of interest from potential partners has been put out.
Once partnerships
have been formalised, founder populations of about 20 black rhino will be released simultaneously on to the land. Experience has shown that releasing relatively large groups simultaneously is optimal for rapid population growth.
The project is one of a handful of high-profile international projects funded by WWF Netherlands, through WWF South Africa.
Black rhino used to be so common in Africa that it was not unusual to encounter dozens in a day. But by the 1960s they had been hunted down to a fraction of their former numbers - and then a massive poaching wave fuelled by the Asian and Middle Eastern rhino horn market wiped out 96 percent of the remaining population in just 20 years. By 1992 there were less than 3 000 black rhino left in the wild.
Since then, the catastrophic decline has levelled off, and black rhino numbers have slowly increased in heavily protected reserves.
Ezemvelo KZN Wildlife has a world-class track record in white rhino conservation,
and is also one of Africa's most successful black rhino custodians, with about 530 of the sub-species Diceros bicornis minor, in its care.
But the provincial conservation organisation is running out of space in which the species can breed up quickly.
Ecologists estimate that for the population growth rate to remain high, the number of black rhino in any area should be kept below 75 percent of the area's ecological carrying capacity. Some protected areas are already nearing or at carrying capacity.
Rapid population growth can mean the difference between survival and extinction for an endangered species. In South Africa there was a rapid growth of the overall black rhino population between 1989 and 1996, followed by a levelling off.
If the rapid growth had been maintained for just five more years, South Africa could now have another 250 to 300 black rhino. "It's for this reason that rhino specialists from Ezemvelo KZN Wildlife and WWF have initiated the
Black Rhino Range Expansion Project to stimulate high growth rates again", Flamand said.
The security of existing rhino populations will remain a priority of the Black Rhino Range Expansion Project. But focusing exclusively on keeping existing animals safe at the expense of growth "is like keeping your money under the bed in case you get robbed on the way to the bank", according to Richard Emslie of the African Rhino Specialist Group.
"What on the surface might seem a safe, low-risk strategy could be anything but. It is far more prudent to invest in real growth. Ten years down the line the key question should be how many rhinos there are, not how many rhinos have been poached."
Source: Ezemvelo KZN Wildlife
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