Wildlife

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First rhino from South Africa arrives June

Posted: Monday June 01, 2009 4:27 AM BT

By Valentine Marc Nkwame

The first of the five rhinoceroses that were sent to South Africa in the eighties is expected to be flown back into the country next month.

Benard Murunya the acting conservator for Ngorongoro stated recently that while it has proven too expensive to bring all the five rhinos at a go, the country was prepared to fly back the animals one after another as costs permit. Experts estimate that it may take at least US $100,000 to transport one Rhino from South Africa to (possibly) Kilimanjaro International Airport.

"There is also another country which has promised to assist Tanzania in footing the bill of bringing back the Tanzanian rhinos from South Africa but at the moment we won't divulge its identity,” Deputy Minister for Tourism, Ezekiel Maige added when he visited the Northern Zone Circuit recently.

Neither the conservator nor the Minister was in position to tell where the rhinos will be placed once brought back.

Around this time last year, the United States Government had expressed interest to help Tanzania bring back the pack of rhinoceroses that had been taken to a South African animal sanctuary some years ago and now the country is struggling to have the animals back.

This was expressed by the then Secretary of the US Department of Interior, Dirk Kempthorne who had represented former US President George Bush at the Leon Sullivan Summit in Arusha in June 2008. Kempthorne stated this in Ngorongoro area when he together with other Summit delegates toured the park as part of the convention program.

Kempthorne was responding to the issue raised by the director of wildlife, Erasmus Tarimo regarding the rare species of rhinoceroses that had been taken to South Africa and which Tanzania was struggling to bring back.

Tanzania has been negotiating with the South African Government on how the animals could be brought back in order to boost the number of rhinos in local National parks and game reserves. According to Tarimo, the only problem so far is how to fly the huge and heavy animals here with regard to costs. Each animal may need own cargo plane.

At that point, the Dirk Kempthorne, the US Secretary of the interior chipped in by saying his government will see how it can assist Tanzania to ferry the animals back home.

At the moment the Ngorongoro Conservation Area has a total of 24 rhinos all of which are equipped with GPS tracking system to protect them from poachers who hunt them for their horns.

In Asia rhino horns are believed to have medicinal values, but elsewhere the horns are used to make varieties of expensive artifacts.

It is estimated that less than 50 rhinoceroses survive in Tanzania today.

The rhinoceros consist of five species of odd-toed ungulates in the family Rhinocerotidae. Two of these species are native to Africa and three to southern Asia. Three of the five species (Javan, Sumatran and Black Rhinoceros) are said to be critically endangered.

The Indian rhino is also on the verge of extinction, with fewer than 2,700 individuals left on earth while the White Rhino is registered as Vulnerable, with roughly 14,500 remaining in the wild.

The number of Black Rhinos had reportedly declined by 96 percent, worldwide, between 1970 and 1992.

In the 1980s, many dedicated conservationists and wildlife policy advocates throughout Africa realized that a serious long-term strategic program had to be developed in order to save the African Black Rhino from complete extinction.

By then there were less than 100 rhinos in Tanzania, in very widely dispersed small population groups. There were very few left in Kenya as well as most of central Africa.

In the face of the shrinking rhino populations, Tanzania, with the help of other African Parks, governments, and conservationists, planned a protected breeding program that would increase the black rhino numbers.

Mkomazi Game Reserve Rhino Sanctuary is the result. The rhino sanctuary occupies 43 square miles of the total 2,200 square miles of the Mkomazi Game Reserve, with guards patrolling the electrified, alarmed fence around the sanctuary.

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