Trophy Hunting

[Richprins]

This report is nice but it doesn't really say much? I love Adam Cruise and he is very sharp.

This is basically the bottom line and does not pertain to the trophy hunting industry ethos:

It also cited the exploitation of minority groups as an issue, both by other ethnic groups and the government

[Richprins]

SA allocates 10 leopards, 10 rhino and 150 elephants to trophy hunters

TIMESLIVE - 26 February 2022


Trophy hunters will be allowed to kill 10 leopards in SA this year, says environment minister Barbara Creecy. Image: 123rf/stuporter

Ten leopards, 10 black rhino and 150 elephants have been earmarked for trophy hunters in 2022, forestry, fisheries and environment minister Barbara Creecy announced on Friday.

A statement from Creecy's department said trophy hunting creates economic incentives that promote conservation.

“It also provides a useful wildlife management tool and is used as a means to remove (mostly) excess males from a population, while revenue is generated at the same time to cover the costs of conservation efforts,” it said.

The quota of 10 leopards — seven from Limpopo, two from North West and one from KwaZulu-Natal — is informed by data from a national monitoring programme, said the statement.

“Leopard hunts will only be allowed in areas where leopard populations are stable or increasing, and only male leopards seven years of age or older may be hunted” to reduce the risk of “overharvesting”.


Ten male black rhinos have been allocated to trophy hunters in 2022.

Only adult male black rhinos will be hunted “and only on conservation management grounds in accordance with a set of strict criteria to ensure that demographic and/or genetic conservation is enhanced”, said the statement.

“The quota for black rhino is based on the national population estimates for black rhino per subspecies, all three of which show an increasing trend.”

Similarly, the national elephant herd was growing and “the quota of 150 is well within sustainable limits”.

The statement said SA's approach “ensures that hunting of these animals does not have a negative impact on the wild populations of these species”.

It added: “Regulated and sustainable hunting is an important conservation tool in SA as it incentivises the private sector and communities to conserve valuable wildlife species and to participate in wildlife-based land uses, ultimately contributing to the conservation of the country’s biodiversity.

“Income generated by trophy hunting is especially critical for marginalised and impoverished rural communities.”

In 2019, before Covid-19 disrupted the sector, hunting contributed R1.4bn to the economy, “excluding the economic contribution to tourism and all hunting and safari-related industries”.

The statement added: “The income generated by the species fees totalled approximately R1.1bn, of which approximately R208m was derived from the trophy hunting of threatened or endangered species.

“The biodiversity sector employed more than 418,000 people in 2019, which is comparable to mining. It is a sector that is expected to continue to show economic and employment growth in the foreseeable future.

“These species are central to a vibrant international hunting industry, and hunting is a part of SA heritage and culture. This is a sector that generates economic benefits as part of the rural economy.”

TimesLIVE

[Lisbeth]

10 black rhinos She must be crazy

[Lisbeth]

WORLD WILDLIFE DAY

South Africa’s war on wild animals


Video screen grabs from an undercover investigation at Safari Club International‘s annual hunters‘ convention in Las Vegas. (Photo: HSI / Africa)

By Don Pinnock | 02 Mar 2022

If you want to kill animals for fun, South Africa is the place. Topping the list of favourites by trophy hunters are lions, baboons, southern lechwes, caracals and vervet monkeys.
_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
South Africa is one of the world’s greatest suppliers of wildlife trophies, many of them from captive-bred animals. The greatest number are shot by people from the US. From tigers to vervet monkeys, it’s all legal.

A report by the Humane Society International/Africa (HSI/Africa) — Trophy Hunting by the Numbers — quantifies a global industry dedicated to the “sport” of accumulating wild animal parts for bragging rights by largely non-African hunters. It was released to coincide with World Wildlife Day today (Thursday).

South Africa is listed as the world’s second-largest exporter of hunting trophies (after Canada), with most going to the US, followed by Spain, Russia and Denmark.


Video screen grabs from an undercover investigation at Safari Club International‘s annual hunters‘ convention in Las Vegas. (Photo: HSI / Africa)

The report is, as it says, about numbers and coincides with the latest hunting quotas for this year released by the Department of the Environment: 10 critically endangered black rhino, 150 endangered elephants — which will mostly be hunted in the Associated Private Nature Reserves and thus be from free-ranging Kruger Park herds — and 10 leopards, listed as vulnerable and with no known population estimates to back the allocation.

This is concerning news, says the report, especially on World Wildlife Day, which is intended to celebrate our collective natural heritage each year on 3 March and draw attention to the plight of threatened and endangered wild animals.

Between 2014 and 2018 (the latest complete data set from the UN trade organisation CITES), South Africa exported 21,018 trophies, an average of 4,204 a year. Of these, 4,176 were lion, 1,337 were elephant, 1,295 were hippo, 675 were rhino and 574 were leopard.

One in three trophy kills were of animals captive-bred for hunting, including most of the lions. However, nearly all elephants, rhinos and leopards hunted were wild-sourced.


A hunter with his kill. (Photo: HSI / Africa)

Smaller species included 2,729 baboons, 2,422 southern lechwe, 1,693 caracals, 1,453 vervet monkeys, 496 civets, 410 blue duikers, 385 servals, 229 Barbary sheep, 250 honey badgers and a brown bear.

Critically endangered, endangered and vulnerable non-native species were also sourced and hunted in South Africa, including tigers, Indian hog deer, Arabian oryx and addax.

By far the largest importer of trophies was the US (54%), followed by Spain (5%), Russia (4%) and Denmark (3%). Other countries included Hungary, Mexico, China, Australia, Poland, Germany, the UK and France.

During the period, 2,227 trophies were imported to South Africa, mostly elephant, Hartmann’s mountain zebra, leopard and hippo, mainly from Namibia, Zimbabwe and Mozambique.

“The results of this study,” says the report, “demonstrate that South Africa is a major player in the international trophy hunting industry. This is something that the South Africa trophy hunting industry and the government of South Africa have promoted.

“[They] further proudly claim that trophy hunting contributes to conservation. The truth, as revealed in this study, is that trophy hunting as practised in South Africa is based on highly managed and manipulated animals as opposed to wild animals.


A hunter with his kill. (Photo: HSI / Africa)

“In South Africa, hunted animals are bred, bought, sold, transported and otherwise processed and ultimately delivered to a property where a trophy hunter can kill them, and where the kill is often guaranteed. It is all about the money that can be made by industrialising, managing and manipulating wildlife for economic gain.

“This has significant negative impacts on animal welfare, provides opportunities for illegal wildlife trade and seriously undermines claims that trophy hunting contributes to conservation.”

Although largely statistical, the report also noted some hunting methods suggested by hunt outfitters:

• “Baboons are similar to a human in physiology, so a chest shot will suffice.”

• “If you aren’t hunting aardwolf in Africa, but the opportunity to take one comes while on a different hunt, then whatever rifle you have at the moment will do the job. Try to place the bullet just behind the shoulder, about one-third of the way up the body.”

• “Hunting blue duiker is most likely best done using a shotgun. Classic shot placement of course would be on or just behind the shoulder. However, when hunting blue duiker, one may have to settle for a hit wherever it can be made.”

• “Hunting serval with dogs is usually conducted in the mornings. After lunch you can nap and then go out after dark, spotlighting.”

• “This outfitter utilises a live camera system that allows the honey badger bait sites to be monitored 24 hours a day from the hunting lodge. You can actually watch the bait sites while you are eating or relaxing at the lodge!”

• “African wildcat hunting mainly takes place during a hunt for other animals. Should the African wildcat be facing away, then what’s commonly called ‘The Texas Brain Shot’ — aiming at the base of the tail where it joins the body — will put it down.”

• “When hit well, the vervet monkey won’t go very far. They leave a poor blood trail because they bleed out rapidly. Unless the monkey goes down and stays down, wait about 15 minutes before doing a follow-up.”

An economic review of eight countries in Africa, including South Africa, demonstrated that the total economic contribution of trophy hunters was a mere 0.03% of the gross domestic product in those eight countries.

Conservation experts and professionals say that trophy hunting “yields low returns at household levels with only a fraction of generated income reaching local communities”.


Leopard taxidermy at the annual SCI convention in 2020. (Photo: HSI / Africa)

“We are terribly disappointed that the DFFE [Department of Fisheries, Forestry and the Environment] is failing in its duty to protect our threatened and endangered wildlife species,” says Dr Audrey Delsink, wildlife director for HSI/Africa.

“It’s unacceptable that we allow people to hunt endangered and critically endangered animals for the purpose of collecting their remains as trophies.

“The claim that trophy hunting contributes to conservation cannot be justified in light of the evidence demonstrating that one third of South Africa’s hunting trophies are captive-bred animals and many are non-native or species not subject to science-based population management.

“The captive breeding and intensive farming of wild animals in South Africa for profit often harms conservation efforts, with negative impacts on biodiversity when protected landscapes are carved up into breeding camps and predators are targeted as competition.

“Killing animals for ‘fun’ is part of the archaic ‘if it pays it stays’ concept that demands immediate change. Killing animals for pleasure has no place in conservation.” DM/OBP

[Richprins]

Once again the greenie blah blah, without making any room for the benefits of hunting!


“The claim that trophy hunting contributes to conservation cannot be justified in light of the evidence demonstrating that one third of South Africa’s hunting trophies are captive-bred animals and many are non-native or species not subject to science-based population management.

So two thirds are on conservation land.

“The captive breeding and intensive farming of wild animals in South Africa for profit often harms conservation efforts, with negative impacts on biodiversity when protected landscapes are carved up into breeding camps and predators are targeted as competition.

The camps and farms for breeding are tiny in comparison, and the income provides for many families and creates huge foreign currency influx. None of the species are endangered.

[Lisbeth]

Trophy hunting does not have any benefits IMO.

[Lisbeth]

SA government marks World Wildlife Day with trophy hunting quotas sacrificing threatened leopard, endangered elephant and critically endangered black rhino “as conservation tool(s)”

BY HSI - 28TH FEBRUARY 2022 - HUMANE SOCIETY INTERNATIONAL

Humane Society International/Africa’s new report states 83% of exported trophies from South Africa are captive-bred animals, non-native species or species without science-based management plans, undermining claims that trophy hunting promotes conservation.

Cape Town – (28 February 2022) The Department of Forestry, Fisheries and the Environment (DFFE) announced this weekend that South Africa will allow the hunting of 10 threatened leopard, 150 endangered elephant and 10 critically endangered black rhino in 2022. This news precedes World Wildlife Day, which celebrates our collective natural heritage each year on 3 March and draws attention to the plight of threatened and endangered wild animals.
This week, Humane Society International/Africa (HSI/Africa), releases its Trophy Hunting by the Numbers Report, which highlights South Africa’s shameful role as Africa’s largest exporter of hunting trophies, and the second largest exporter globally (behind the United States) of Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species Wild Fauna and Flora–listed species.
The data cited in HSI/Africa’s report contradicts the DFFE’s argument in favour of the trophy hunting quotas – that the “regulated and sustainable hunting is an important conservation tool in South Africa”. It confirms that 83% of trophies exported from South Africa are from captive-bred animals, non-native species or species that are not subject to scientific-based management plans such as caracal, baboons and honey badgers. Also, only 25% of native-species trophies exported as trophies are species managed with a national conservation plan.

An economic review in eight countries in Africa, including South Africa, demonstrated that the total economic contribution of trophy hunters was at most about 0.03% of Gross Domestic Product, whilst overall tourism accounted for between 2.8% and 5.1% of GDP in those eight countries. Furthermore, conservation experts and professionals have critiqued trophy hunting as it “yields low returns at household levels with only a fraction of generated income reaching local communities”. This argues the DFFE’s statement that “Income generated by trophy hunting is especially critical for marginalised and impoverished rural communities.”

Dr Audrey Delsink, wildlife director for HSI/Africa says: “We are terribly disappointed that the DFFE is failing in its duty to protect our threatened and endangered wildlife species. It is unacceptable that we allow people to hunt endangered and critically endangered animals for the purpose of collecting their remains as trophies. The claim that trophy hunting contributes to conservation cannot be justified in light of the evidence demonstrating that one-third of South Africa’s hunting trophies are captive bred animals, and most are non-native or species not subject to science-based population management.

The captive breeding and intensive farming of wild animals in South Africa for profit often harms in situ conservation efforts, with negative impacts on biodiversity when protected landscapes are carved up into breeding camps and predator population structures, as predators are targeted as competition. Trophy hunting further threatens the survival of threatened species such as leopards who already face multiple threats including habitat loss and degradation, poaching and illegal trade and lethal conflict with humans. Killing animals for ‘fun’ is part of the archaic ‘if it pays it stays’ concept that demands immediate change. The ongoing and worsening biodiversity and climate change crises demand new science-based approaches to conservation that better serve our communities and our wildlife. Killing animals for pleasure has no place in conservation.”

The Trophy Hunting by the Numbers Study is the first of its kind and provides information on South Africa’s role in the international trade in hunting trophies of mammal species listed under CITES during the most recent five-year period for which complete data are available (2014-2018).

Key findings from the study include:

• South Africa is the second largest exporter of trophies of CITES-listed species globally, exporting 16% of the global total of hunting trophies, 4204 trophies on average per year.

• South Africa is the biggest exporter of CITES-listed species in Africa. South Africa exported 50% more trophies than Africa’s second largest exporter Namibia, and more than three times that of Africa’s third largest exporter, Zimbabwe.

• About 83% of trophies exported are captive-bred animals or non-native species, and native species with neither a national conservation management plan nor adequate data on their wild populations or the impact of trophy hunting on them. This data challenges the assertion that trophy hunting is critical to in situ conservation.

• The top five species exported as trophies from South Africa are African lion (mostly captive), chacma baboon, southern lechwe (captive, non-native), caracal and vervet monkey.

• The most common captive-source species exported from South Africa over the period was the African lion, comprising 58% of the total number of captive-source trophies exported.

• Most (90%) trophies exported from South Africa originated in South Africa.

• 68% of trophies exported from South Africa were from wild animals, while 32% were from captive animals –(19% bred in captivity and 13% were born in captivity.

• 90% of the 6,738 captive-source trophies exported during 2014-2018 were African lion or non-native southern lechwe.

• 1,337 African elephant trophies were exported during 2014-2018, and 47% went to the United States.

• 4,176 African lion trophies were exported during 2014-2018 and 94% were captive-source. 52% went to the United States.

• 574 African leopard trophies were exported during 2014-2018, 53% were exported to the United States.

• 2,227 trophies were imported to South Africa 2014-2018, mostly African elephant, Hartmann’s mountain zebra,

• African leopard and hippopotamus and mostly from Namibia, Zimbabwe and Mozambique.

• The top ten importing countries of South African wildlife trophies are:

[Lisbeth]

Value of trophy hunting to conservation massively overstated: report


Leopard taxidermy at the annual Safari Club International Convention in 2020. (Photo: HSUS)

By Don Pinnock | 22 Mar 2022

A myth-busting exercise on hunting questions the claim that bagging wildlife trophies is sustainable.
_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
When you strip trophy hunting to its essentials, it’s about the desire to kill wild animals – justified by faulty economics. What it’s not about is conservation or community upliftment. That’s the finding of an extensive study by the Africa-wide research organisation Good Governance Africa (GGA).

Written by natural resource economist Dr Ross Harvey, the study avoids complex issues of animal welfare and simply asks who benefits from trophy hunting and whether it can be justified in terms of conservation.

Hunting organisations and the Department of Forestry, Fishing and the Environment (DFFE) maintain that trophy hunting is of value to both conservation and local communities.

In February the department announced a hunting quota for 10 black rhinos, 10 leopards and 150 elephants. It justified the quotas by claiming that income generated by trophy hunting was critical for marginalised and impoverished rural communities, and that this form of hunting created economic incentives that promote conservation, was a useful wildlife management tool to remove excess males from a population and a way to generate conservation revenue.

According to Harvey, the DFFE is unable to prove any of these claims. The costs and benefits just don’t add up.

Its high-level panel claimed that trophy hunting was a justifiable conservation tool on the grounds of the economic benefits it purportedly produces. The GGA report sets out to test such views by asking questions.

What’s trophy hunting’s value to the economy?

According to the GGA report, compared with tourism, trophy hunting provides very little economic benefit to the country.

Almost no peer-reviewed economic work addresses the question and the only paper that does – by Professor Melville Saayman and others, written in 2018 – is questionable in its methodological rigour, according to the GGA report.


A hunter with his kill. (Photo: Humane Society International-Africa)

Saayman estimates the value of trophy hunting to South Africa at $341-million for the 2015/16 season. By contrast, tourism in 2019 was worth $22.1-billion. So, trophy hunting represents less than 2% of the total tourism value to the country.

What value are hunted species to the overall economy? According to Saayman, in the years assessed by him and his co-authors, the total estimated combined revenue earned from hunting elephant, giraffe, lion, white rhino and leopard amounted to $604,300.

Leopard hunts earned a mere $30,500.

“This renders it difficult to warrant a public policy decision to continue hunting the species,” says Harvey, “especially given its vulnerability.”

Hunted elephants earned an estimated $100,500, a minuscule amount compared with what an elephant earns in potential ecotourism value over its lifetime. Their loss, says Harvey, seems too high a price to pay in an industry that is literally dying because of lower elephant densities and smaller tusk sizes from poaching and trophy hunting.

White rhino earned $40,500.

“Again, given unprecedented levels of recent poaching of rhinos, on both public and private land, it appears difficult to justify a policy decision to make rhino available for trophy hunting.”


Photo: Humane Society International-Africa

Does trophy hunting serve conservation?

There is little doubt that human beings have overstepped a number of interconnected planetary boundaries leading to planetary warming and biodiversity collapse. At least one million animal and plant species are reportedly threatened with extinction.

In this context, says the GGA report, the world is rightly asking whether the legally sanctioned killing of wild animals can reasonably be tolerated.

“Given that trophy hunting is an obvious form of direct exploitation that undermines ecosystem functionality and is hardly a requirement for human survival, its continuation should be plainly understood as a likely hindrance to conservation.”

Increasingly, says Harvey, it also undermines tourism potential, which strengthens the argument for the abandonment of the practice.

“In short, it is extremely challenging to sustain an economic argument in favour of trophy hunting in South Africa as a key conservation tool.”

The argument is often made by hunters that trophy hunting is the only conservation alternative in non-photographic areas. The report calls this a false dichotomy in which alternatives are not tried simply because of the idea that they will not be successful at the appropriate scale.

“In South Africa, the argument for trophy hunting as the only option for conservation in landscapes aesthetically unamenable to photographic tourism appears to be unfounded,” says the report, “as many privately owned trophy hunting ranches are located in areas that are aesthetically pleasing and therefore potentially amenable to non-consumptive tourism.”

In fact, unknown to international tourists, many high-end tourist lodges are situated on land where hunting takes place alongside tourism. Prime examples are Timbavati, Umbabat, Balule and Klaserie.

Is it sustainable?

It appears that many ranches are farming the wild rather than wilding the farm and potentially perpetuating land ownership inequality under the guise of South Africa’s “conservation success story”, says Harvey.


Video screen grabs from an undercover investigation at Safari Club International’s annual hunter’s convention in Las Vegas. (Image: Supplied)

The cost of sustaining wildlife is far greater than the revenue generated hunting it. Take lions. A good hunting zone has a lion density of two per 100km2, requiring a hunting area of 5,000km2 to sustainably shoot one lion a year. The annual upkeep alone of such an area in Africa costs about $4-million. A safari to hunt a lion costs about $50,000, a mere 1.25% of the cost of maintaining the lion.

This means, says the report, that the hunting industry does not pay the real price of safaris. The result is that trophy hunting will lead to depletion, not conservation.

Apart from the fact that killing to conserve is a moral contradiction not easily resolved, there’s a critique of trophy hunting on biological grounds.

Trophy hunters demand the best-looking animals because hunting is driven by the aesthetic desire for an animal in its prime. They’re not selecting animals that are surplus to biological requirements, as is often claimed in defence of hunting, says Harvey.

Rather, they’re eliminating animals that would otherwise be contributing to the health of the gene pool.

“The argument that they are only shooting surplus animals, primarily to support conservation efforts, appears dubitable. Elephant tusk sizes, for instance, are becoming increasingly smaller as a result of prime males being targeted.

“Moreover, hunters are selecting the very animals most important to other animals, the ecological integrity of the landscape in which they live and to photographic tourists.”

The major problem, says the GGA report, is that supporting research is extremely thin.

“The recent quota setting, for instance, offers neither a public rationale that connects the stated numbers with corresponding conservation benefits nor a scientific argument for how the figures were derived.

“One would expect that the department would provide an ecological report detailing the exact population dynamics for each species in question and how, based on net growth rates, a certain number could be hunted for trophies without jeopardising population health. But this has not been presented to the public – if indeed it exists.

Do communities benefit?

Given the lack of research in South Africa, the idea that trophy hunting of lions, leopards, rhinos, elephants and giraffe benefits communities appears to lack basis in fact, says the report. What can be claimed with confidence is that most of the economic benefits which come from trophy hunting are not concentrated among low-income households in rural areas.

There is also no research on how the benefits of trophy hunting are distributed. What little information is available is not encouraging.

“At best, the trophy hunting industry – according to its own estimates – supports 15,000 jobs in South Africa. Non-consumptive biodiversity tourism, to the contrary, supports at least 90,000 jobs, according to recent research.”

Even pro-hunting institutions such as the International Council for Game and Wildlife Conservation find that hunting companies, on average, contribute only about 3% of revenue to communities living in hunting areas.

In setting hunting quotas, says the GGA report, the DFFE insists that income generated by trophy hunting is especially critical for marginalised and impoverished rural communities. But that appears to be based on a report to a parliamentary committee which indicates that only 9% of trophy hunting revenue was allocated to community outreach, and only some of that to low-income households.

What the DFFE failed to note is that almost all hunting in South Africa takes place on private land, so it is questionable how this benefits marginalised and impoverished rural communities.


A video screen grab from an undercover investigation at Safari Club International’s annual hunter’s convention in Las Vegas. (Image: Supplied)

This seems to be especially the case in the Associated Private Nature Reserves (APNR) – private land joined together on the boundary of the Kruger National Park. Hunting is carried out in 90% of the APNR where the Kruger fence was dropped in 1996. So, private trophy hunting revenue is being accrued from animals that belong to the South African public.

Trophy hunting, says Harvey, appears to be a hobby for the wealthy that benefits the wealthy and generates little value for poor rural community members.

Is there good governance?

Aside from the obvious lack of economic or conservation arguments in favour of trophy hunting in South Africa, says the report, there’s strong evidence of misgovernance.

“There is next to no evidence that trophy hunting has been, or will be, well governed in South Africa. Even if it was, the fact that the practice may directly undermine other economic activities such as non-consumptive tourism, is a good governance reason to abandon the practice and condemn it.”

The fact that male elephants and lions are sometimes shot in their prime (or in front of tourists), or that contracts are sometimes suddenly allocated to a distant chief, suggest that governance constraints are absent.

Moreover, the process by which trophy hunting quotas are allocated in the APNR remains unclear and is not available to public scrutiny, even though the animals being shot are clearly Kruger Park animals.

The report’s findings, says Harvey by way of conclusion, indicate that trophy hunting is of limited conservation value from an economic perspective. It’s also questionable whether it produces significant economic value on its own limited merits.

“The fact that it provides minuscule economic benefits, especially to poor households, and may directly undermine conservation, appears to be a strong argument in favour of abandoning trophy hunting, especially of iconic species.” DM/OBP

[Richprins]

This is a flailing article, determined to downplay facts while mentioning them!


Their loss, says Harvey, seems too high a price to pay in an industry that is literally dying because of lower elephant densities and smaller tusk sizes from poaching and trophy hunting.

Elephants are abundant and overpopulated. Tuskers are only hunted once they have stopped breeding, so no loss.

15000 jobs is massive, and also probably vastly understated given the supply chain involved with the hunter from flights to lodge accommodation supply etc.

Who are Pinnock and Harvey to just ignore that??

[Lisbeth]

Tuskers are only hunted once they have stopped breeding, so no loss.

I have my doubts about the control of certain rules

15000 jobs is massive

Are you sure of that number? There are many lodges that accommodate both trophy hunters and normal tourists.