Africa Wild

Not if the rhinos are living in the wild. In any case the rhino will always be damaged.

No, it's confiscated horns and horns found in the veld, like in SA?

Richprins wrote:Since they are naturally available, and replenishable?

I was contesting the word "replenishable" (regeneration capacity).

http://www.namibiansun.com/environment/ ... rged.93503

‘Controlled’ ivory trade urged
Submitted by NamibianSun on Mon, 2016-05-09 01:00

Namibia is arguing that the controlled trade in ivory and other elephant specimens, in addition to other direct and indirect forms of the economic use of these animals, is in the best interest of the local elephant population.
The country has submitted its proposal for new measures and policies on the trade of ivory, for consideration at a global wildlife conference to be held South Africa later this year, in which it says that the country’s ivory stockpile is growing on average by 4.5% per year.
The proposal, which has just been handed in by Namibia, aims to amend the listing of the Namibian African elephants as being subject to the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) trade controls.
The document states that the controlled trade of ivory will help to ensure continued access to land outside protected areas, by providing strong incentives to communities to protect elephants and their habitat.
By contrast, law-enforcement alone, without associated incentives, does not provide long-term security from displacement by other forms of land use, Namibia says in its proposal.
The proposal will be decided upon at the triennial meeting of the 182 Parties to CITES (181 countries and the European Union), which will be held from 24 September to 5 October 2016 in Johannesburg, South Africa.
The document indicates that the country’s ivory stocks stands at 8 312 whole elephant tusks and 2 129 ivory pieces, with a total weight of 58 877kg.
The ivory stocks include tusks and ivory pieces recovered from natural mortalities, seizures and also unknown recoveries.
According to figures of ivory seizures in Namibia since 1990, there have been 742 seizures in the country, in which 4 067 elephant tusks have been seized.
The document argues that the growing ivory stocks represent major management, administrative and security problems.
It says that while Namibia continues to exercise strict control over all ivory stocks, it remains concerned over the high costs and security implications of holding large ivory stocks.
“Ivory continues to accumulate, primarily through natural mortalities. The climate in Namibia is dry, making it virtually impossible to maintain ivory quality, without incurring huge expenditures.”
According to the document, Namibia’s elephant population currently stands at more than 22 000. However, the country sees the absence of trade as the greatest threat to the elephant population.
According to the document, this stems from the fact that elephants have in the past had no or very little direct value to rural communities, where so many elephants use land that people also depend on for farming.
“Elephants will only survive in the long-term if they are more valuable to people than their damage to alternative forms of land use, such as subsistence farming.”
The document says that the controlled ivory trade will directly benefit the survival of the species as all revenue will be reinvested in elephant conservation in Namibia, including rural community conservation programmes, and that the monitoring of the impact of trade will be supported.
Furthermore, it was pointed out that if communities are not able to benefit from the presence of elephants, through sustainable utilisation and through trade in ivory recovered from natural mortalities, elephants outside protected areas in Namibia face a serious long-term threat of displacement, through progressive range conversion to agriculture.
The document stresses that no elephants have been or will be killed specifically to obtain ivory or other products for trade. Ivory is recovered from all recorded natural mortalities, as well as elephants destroyed as problem animals, and strict national legislation makes it obligatory for the public to hand in any ivory found.
The document also indicates that the incidence of illegal killing of elephants in Namibia is biologically insignificant.
It further states that incidents of illegal hunting of elephants in Namibia include cases of illegal shooting before or after elephants have damaged or have threatened to damage crops and farms, and where no attempt is made to collect the ivory.
It is nevertheless very difficult to separate illegal hunting, with the intent to collect ivory, from all hunting incidents, and illegal hunting is notoriously difficult to monitor.
Namibia has, however, contributed fully to the system to monitor the illegal trade in ivory and the illegal hunting of elephants, the document says.
A total of 78 elephants were illegally killed in 2012, 38 elephants were killed in 2013 and 78 in 2014.
Last year, 49 elephants were killed, and up to April this year, nine elephants have been killed.
ELLANIE SMIT

http://uk.reuters.com/article/uk-wildli ... KKCN0XZ0GD

World | Sun May 8, 2016 1:37pm BST Related: WORLD, AFRICA
African countries deeply divided over ivory trade before U.N. meeting
JOHANNESBURG | BY ED STODDARD

Member states of the U.N. Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) are not meeting until September, but some African countries have already drawn their battle lines on divisive issues such as the ivory trade.

Proposals for the meeting in Johannesburg were made public this week, pitting bids by Namibia and Zimbabwe to open up the trade in elephant ivory, against initiatives led by Kenya for a complete global ban on the coveted commodity.

Those seeking to open up the trade of wild animal products argue it will raise badly-needed funds for conservation, but others say it would provide cover to poachers and make products that can endanger species socially acceptable to consumers.

WERBUNG

"In all of these issues we have two competing views. They are all aiming for the same objective which is ensuring the survival of species in the wild," CITES Secretary-General John Scanlon told Reuters.

Global trade of ivory is banned though CITES has allowed one-off sales of national stockpiles. Several countries also allow domestic trade.

Kenya, long at the forefront of efforts to shut the ivory trade down completely, last week torched thousands of elephant tusks and rhino horns.

But the African kingdom of Swaziland wants to sell rhino horn to pay for anti-poaching efforts.

"The poaching crisis is really out of control and you have more and more countries that realise the only way to really stop it is to stop the trade," said Susan Lieberman, vice president for International Policy at the Wildlife Conservation Society.

Other initiatives called for added protection for lions. Last year the highly-publicised killing of a big cat named "Cecil" by an American trophy hunter in Zimbabwe provoked a global outcry.

There is also a push to ban commercial trade in several species of pangolin - scaly mammals with long snouts - which are being wiped out in Africa and Asia by rampant hunting for their highly prized meat.

"CONTROLLED TRADE"

CITES held its last "Conference of the Parties" - where proposed amendments regarding trade in wild animals and plants are voted on by member states - three years ago. The agreements are legally binding but only regulate international trade and do not replace national laws.

Since then, tens of thousands of African elephants have been poached for ivory and thousands of rhinos killed for their horns to meet soaring demand in Asia, dramatically raising the ecological, economic and emotional stakes in this upcoming round of wildlife diplomacy.

In the 1970s, Africa had about 1.2 million elephants, but now has 400,000 to 450,000.

However, in some countries, notably in southern Africa, populations have been growing. In its proposal, Namibia noted that its elephant population has risen from 7,500 in 1995 to over 20,000 at present.

"Namibia ... wishes to establish a regular form of controlled trade in all elephant specimens, including ivory, in support of elephant conservation," its proposal said. It said its ivory stockpile was growing by 4.5 percent per year, mostly from natural deaths.

Ivory has one source - a dead animal. Rhino horn by contrast can be cut off a tranquilised animal and grows back.

Surging security costs for wildlife against poachers are also a concern which pro-traders say can be met by selling stockpiles. Swaziland estimates it could raise almost $10 million (£6.9 million) from its 330 kg (700 pounds) of rhino horn at a wholesale price of $30,000 a kg.

"Who is going to pick up the tab for the annual security bill for rhinos which is now estimated at 1.2 to 2 billion rand a year (£56 million to £93.2 million)," said Pelham Jones, chairman of South Africa's Private Rhino Owners Association.

South Africa's environment ministry said on Sunday that rhino poaching was in decline but the country was still on track to potentially lose over 1,000 of the animals this year, with 363 of the pachyderms illicitly killed in the first four months of 2016 compared to 404 in the same period in 2015.

Cash-strapped Zimbabwe said trade was the only way to pay for the costs of protecting its 80,000 elephants. Zimbabwe's proposal says it has 70 tonnes of raw ivory in the government storage facility estimated to be worth $35 million.

"A legal trade in ivory would be beneficial for the Zimbabwe elephant population. Without it, elephants are likely to become extinct in Zimbabwe," it said in its proposal.

(Editing by Raissa Kasolowsky)

Benin, Burkina Faso, Central African Republic, Chad, Kenya, Liberia, Niger, Nigeria, Senegal, Sri Lanka and Uganda call for inclusion of all populations of African elephant in Appendix I through the transfer from Appendix II to Appendix I of the populations of Botswana, Namibia, South Africa and Zimbabwe:

https://cites.org/sites/default/files/e ... odonta.pdf

I agree! Trade!

Nooit RP,!!!!!

Allison Thomson‎
to
Outraged SA Citizens against Poaching:
2 hrs ·

This article is from Cameroon and is in French but the basic google translation is that a group of eco guards came across poachers and one of the eco guards was hit in the leg. They were unable to get him out of the area and retreated themselves as they were out fired (poachers had more sophisticated weapons). When they finally when back to retrieve their eco guard the poachers had beheaded him.

May his soul rest in peace
frown emoticon

http://www.camerounlink.com/news/…

Free trade will establish a market price even fluctuating, poachers
are prepared to do the dirty work for a menial price. Will be the rhino
farmers biggest head ache!!! But then again once the farmer has got rid
of over stock, why should he care, the sheckles in the bank!!!!

Nooit boet nooit,...

Only one way to find out!

The stockpiles in both species will get "redeployed" anyway, slowly but surely!

No Boet we are creating a false excuse for a farce market here.
This will not be the way out of a predicament,....for one valid
argument rhino's have time against them..

Nooit Boet, listening to the arguments at the International Oscap
meet about China alone and it's GDP and demands,.

There will be no hope in hell that local farmers can support that
demand..