back to article Rhino horn price spike drives record poaching

Growing demand for quack cures derived from rhinoceros horn have driven horn street value to around $US65,000 per kilo, leading to a one-third increase in poaching from 2010 to 2011. While Reuters reports the South African wild population of rhino still stands at about 20,000, with 443 rhinos poached last year it’s worth …

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  1. Graham Marsden
    Pirate

    I'm pleased to announce that...

    ... new research has shown that a daily dose of PTMP (or Powdered Traditional Medicine Practitioner) has been shown to cure impotence, HIV, cancer and being terminally stupid!

    So don't delay, powerder a Traditional Medicine Practitioner today!

  2. Martin Gregorie

    Hey, I've got a great idea

    Sell licenses to hunt the poachers, thus killing two birds with one stone.

    Besides, it makes the hunt a bit more even handed if the game can shoot back.

    1. Stoneshop

      Can't we launch the myth

      that ground and powdered poacher penises are the most potent aphrodisiac known? And that the optimal preparation is that they have to be ground up while still attached to its original owner.

      1. ravenviz Silver badge
        Thumb Up

        It'll be very difficult to get any sufficient quantity because they're so small.

      2. Ken Hagan Gold badge

        Re: launching myths

        How about leaking the idea that poachers are terrorists on training exercises?

        I mean, it's not like the world is short of shockingly well-resourced search and destroy teams. All we have to do is persuade them to take an interest.

  3. jubtastic1

    Cant we use science?

    Couldn't we clone Rhino horn and flood the black market with it? It's not like cloned horn will be any less effective medicine or distinguishable from real horn, dump enough on the market and the price will drop till its not worth the bother to go out and kill a real animal.

    Are you listening boffins? Forget the sheep, the big eared mice and the six arsed monkeys, clone something worthwhile for a change.

    1. skeptical i

      Why even waste time cloning rhinos? Powdered cow horn should work just as well.

      Reduce disposal costs for abattoirs too, a problem-solving two-fer.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Sorry to disappoint you, but...

        ... Chemically, cow horns and rhino horns are not identical in composition.

        But I do like where you're going with this ;-)

      2. ravenviz Silver badge
        Facepalm

        Rhino horns are made out of hair.

  4. proto-robbie
    Pirate

    given the prices involved...

    ... there are some very wealthy and powerful Chinese people buying this stuff, entirely based on superstition.

    I don't see why this couldn't be subject to trade sanction and governmental pressure - taking the Pandas hostage, for example?

  5. David Hicks
    Meh

    Sad state the world is in.

    It really puts a downer on your day. They're probably right that sustainably managed wildlife with an eye to selling 'hunting' licenses and 'hunting' tourism is the only way some of these animals will survive.

    How screwed up is that?

    It makes me sick. Also, I have 'hunting' in quotes because AFAICT the industry sells an easy shoot of an exotic animal to rich fat men, it doesn't seem much like hunting to me.

  6. arthvr
    Unhappy

    It's more corruption than sustainable management

    You can be certain of one thing: any money produced by fat white men with small penises who pay to "hunt" rhinos will disappear into the pockets of officials rather than sustain wildlife in South Africa. In the rest of Africa wildlife is more or less doomed in the long run thanks to outside powers who flooded the continent with AK-47s.

    It would be different if "hunters" were to do it in traditional African style, wearing a loincloth and carrying a spear.

  7. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    It's not as if

    it's even similar to the Gorilla "try telling him it's not food" ad where we saw a tribesman and his starving family, this is just purely like the ivory "status decorations" trade in the 1900's.

    As for the quack trade, here in the UK most "free" papers are chock full of spiritualis ads and witch doctors claiming to cure any ailments at a price, like the drugs trades, whilst demand and belief are there you wont stop the rich using it.

  8. JimmyPage Silver badge

    Wasn't there an initiative a while back

    to sedate rhinos, and replace the horn (which is actually matted hair) with big shiny metal prosthesis - thus frustrating the poachers ?

    1. Henry 4
      Unhappy

      Optional

      Sort of... Unfortuately the poachers were killing the animals without horns out of spite and also to stop them hunting the same animal again in future.

      :(

  9. handle

    Superstitious nonsense

    Second only to reviews of audio equipment on here, though buying that is a little less destructive to wildlife I'll grant you.

  10. perlcat
    Black Helicopters

    More proof

    There is no cure for stupid.

  11. Oldfogey

    Fake Rhino Horn

    Back to earlier posts, it should not be too difficult to produce a synthetic imitation powdered rhino horn that will pass basic tests. Feed this into the black market in large quantities, and eventually the price will drop. poaching will become uneconomic, and practically vanish.

    1. Charles 9

      Nah.

      Word will get out that imitation horn powder is on the loose. That it's not good, could make you sick, even. Next thing you know, the demand will switch to WHOLE horn. Besides, they'll spin a yarn that the mystic effects of rhino horn actually dissipate within 60 minutes of grinding (exposure to the air and such) so that it's actually for the best to get the horn whole, grind and imbibe it in one sitting.

      Counterfeiting rhino horn powder (essentially keratin) is one thing. Counterfeiting a whole rhino horn (including the shape, colours, and natural impuriies--which are supposedly the "magic ingredients" in rhino horn) would probably get more complicated.

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