Rhinoceros
Rhinoceros Endangerment
There are five
types of rhinoceros on Earth. They are the Indian,
Sumatran, Javan, Black,
and White rhinos. All five species of rhinos are very
close to extinction.
The rhino population made a rapid decrease in the 1970’s
when half of the
world’s rhinos disappeared. There are an estimated 10,500
rhinos left
worldwide. Their endangerment was cause by several reasons. The
Black
Rhinoceros population had decreased 90 percent since 1970. There
were
approximately 65,000 black rhinos then and there are about 2,500 now.
Unlike
most large mammals, habitat loss has not been a significant factor in
the
decline of these rhinos. Rhino horns have always been thought to have
great
powers. In 5th century BC, a rhino horn was believed capable of
rendering some
poisons harmless. In other times and places, rhino horns were
hung in a room
where a woman was giving birth, believing it would ease her
labor pains. Asians
used rhino horns in traditional medicines for a thousand
years without
threatening the species’ power. Most people think that the
decline of rhinos
is because of poaching. This isn’t true. The cause was the
soaring price of
oil. Young men in the Arab country of Yemen covet rhino
horns for elaborately
carved dagger handles, symbols of wealth and status in
that country. Until the
1970’s, few men could afford these prized dagger
handles. But Yemen and other
Middle Eastern countries are rich in oil,
and prices for this "Black Gold"
climbed dramatically in that decade due to a
worldwide oil shortage. The result
was a seven-fold increase in the per
capita income in Yemen, a rise in wealth
that made rhino horn dagger handles
within the reach of almost everyone. This
small country, with a population of
6 million at the time, suddenly became the
world’s largest importer of rhino
horns. In order to keep the rhino’s from
going extinct, there are some major
efforts being made. Some rhinos are being
moved away from unsafe areas where
poachers are operating, to safe sanctuaries,
and protection is being
increased for rhinos in existing conservation areas.
Efforts are being
made to stop the illegal international trade in rhino horn,
and harsher
penalties for people caught poaching and dealing in the rhino horn
are being
introduced. Also, people are being persuaded to stop using rhino horn
for
medicines and cultural purposes. Human communities living in areas
where
rhino are found must be able to benefit from conservation efforts. For
example,
some of the money paid by tourists coming to see the rhino should be
used to
improve the local living conditions. This encourages the local people
to protect
the rhino. The World Wildlife Federation (WWF) has played and
important role in
many pioneering approaches to rhino conservation, including
the development of
radio-telemetry systems for monitoring, further dehorning
of rhinos as a
deterrent to poaching, and the re-establishment of locally
extinct rhino
populations. It has also redirected its focus to the two most
important African
rhino range states – South Africa and Namibia. Throughout
the 1990’s, WWF
also provided substantial support to Namibia’s rhino
conservation efforts. To
secure what is the largest single population of
black rhinos remaining on the
continent, equipment and funds for ground and
air surveillance have been made
available to the Ministry of Environment and
Tourism for work in Etosha National
Park. Efforts have also focused on
protecting the "desert-adapted’
subspecies, Diceros bicornis bicornis, the
majority of which survive only in
Namibia. WWF believes that rhino
conservation and management in Namibia has also
benefited from ongoing
efforts to ensure that the rural communities that share
their land with these
animals obtain direct and sustainable benefits from
wildlife-based tourism.
Hopefully, these efforts will help the rhino population
grow back to the
numbers they were in the 1960’s. These animals have been
roaming the Earth
for a very lone time and if we protect them instead of kill
them, they will
be roaming for many years to come. There will be many challenges
in the
future to preserve these magnificent creatures. If we help and
support
organizations such as the WWF, we will be successful in this
battle.