Wild southern white rhinoceroses could go extinct in just nine years because of poaching, but could be saved if trade in their horns were to be carefully managed.
Poachers killed almost 1,000 southern white rhinoceroses (Ceratotherium simum simum; pictured) for their horns in 2013, some 5% of the total population. Enrico Di Minin of the University of Helsinki and his colleagues used population and economic models to estimate extinction risk and the cost of anti-poaching patrols.
The models suggest that the species could be saved by a carefully controlled trade in horn collected from rhinos that die naturally or harvested from live animals without killing them. Money from this would fund increased anti-poaching patrols and create an income source for local people, deterring them from poaching.
Conserv. Biol. http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/cobi.12412 (2014)
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Horn trade could save rhinos. Nature 514, 406 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1038/514406c
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/514406c
