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Text by Tim Jackson
First published by Africa Geographic www.africageographic.com
The government of Namibia lays claim to the country’s entire population of black rhinos. No one but the State may sell them, move them or allow them to be hunted. It seems like a draconian measure, but the bottom line is that black rhinos are prospering under the regime. So too are the people from all walks of Namibian life who are involved with their conservation. Tim Jackson investigates.
The story of the black rhino in Namibia during the second half of the 20th century was one of doom and gloom, as it was elsewhere in Africa, where the total population crashed from 100 000 animals in the 1960s to about 2 400 by 1995. Yet numbers in Namibia are increasing at a dramatic rate and today the country is home to at least a third of all black rhinos in Africa. Only seven countries have a black rhino population greater than 10 and of these Kenya and Zimbabwe each host well over 500 individuals, while South Africa and Namibia top the list with tallies approaching 1 500. Spared the organised poaching that has plagued South Africa, Zimbabwe and Kenya over the past year, Namibia has lost only four rhinos to poachers since 1997. With key populations in Etosha National Park (the largest in existence) and the adjacent Kaokoveld and Damaraland (a part of the country now known as the Kunene Region), rhino conservation here seems to be flourishing. So what is driving this extraordinary success?
 © Dave Hamman |
One answer is a community-based approach to protecting these animals, coupled with effective law enforcement. Garth Owen-Smith, the regional agricultural officer in Damaraland in the 1960s, recorded about 150 rhinos in the area. This number declined steadily over the next two decades until it was reduced to about half. Things took a turn for the better in 1974, when 40 rhinos were relocated to Etosha. Joining the 20 or so already there, the newcomers thrived.
Then, in the early 1980s, a concerted anti-poaching campaign heralded a change in the fortunes of Namibia’s black rhinos. Spearheaded by Chris Eyre, the government nature conservator in Damaraland, and with the pivotal help of local game guards and communities, the campaign brought many poachers to justice. Government conservation efforts really took off in the early 1990s with the inception of meta-population and rhino custodian programmes. By 2001 there were an estimated 735 black rhinos in Namibia and that number has now doubled.
All black rhinos in Namibia are considered to be the property of the State. This means that the only authority with jurisdiction over them is the government (acting through the Ministry of Environment and Tourism; MET), although management decisions are taken jointly with other rhino stakeholders. It does not, however, signify that all rhinos must be confined to state-run conservation areas such as Etosha National Park – far from it. In fact, the State effectively lends out many rhinos to community and private landowners at their request. In essence, the landowners are custodians, looking after the rhinos on the nation’s behalf. The system seems to work well, although the demand for rhinos far outstrips the number available, despite the strict criteria regarding land management, security and ecological suitability that landowners must meet.
This custodial programme is critical to black rhino conservation, which has witnessed the rapid expansion of the area occupied by the species. Rhinos can now roam some 6 000 square kilometres of private land, encompassing 25 properties, and 73 500 square kilometres of communal conservancies and concessions. Their greater range means that not all the eggs are in the same basket – or rhinos in the same park – and if disaster were to strike in one area, those elsewhere would probably survive.
The custodial programme also allows the MET to continue managing the rhinos as a meta-population, as it has been doing since 1997. By moving individuals from one small, localised population to another, the Ministry aims to prevent inbreeding. At the same time, the dispersal of rhinos around the country helps to increase their numbers, since the denser the population, the more slowly it breeds – as has been witnessed among the desert rhinos of the Kunene Region. The MET is thus boosting the rate at which Namibia’s black rhino population is increasing, and its stated target of five per cent increase per year and doubling the number of rhinos in national parks seems realistic. In fact, if the MET is able to keep to its programme, there is no reason why the population shouldn’t have doubled again by 2029, by which time rhinos could be wandering over 125 000 square kilometres of the Namibian landscape.
Many of the rhinos are concentrated in Etosha, and while the country’s foremost national park may be straining at the seams – it has been described as the ‘engine’ driving rhino production for the whole of Namibia – Khaudum National Park on the border with Botswana has been highlighted as key to providing capacity for the larger population. Rhino-less at present, it holds huge potential, with estimates that it could carry as many as 600.
The Kunene Region is strategically important too, not for the number of rhinos this barren landscape can accommodate but because it can provide a continuous range: 700 kilometres from the Kunene River in the north to the Ugab in the south, and 500 kilometres from Etosha in the east to the Skeleton Coast National Park in the west. To take advantage of this, many of the community conservancies in the area need to be restocked, a process that is already under way. As ranges expand, it is hoped that neighbouring populations will merge naturally into a larger aggregation, easing the burden of translocating the animals and managing them across the country.
Wildlife consultant Rowan Martin emphasised this when he recently updated the country’s black rhino conservation strategy. ‘It would be highly desirable to create a few large continuous ranges for rhinos in Namibia and to get as far away as possible from the 'meta-population–subpopulation” syndrome,’ he suggested. ‘The last thing that Namibia should want is to have its rhinos held in multiple small paddocks scattered like a shotgun blast all over the country.’ While the MET is able to move about 50 rhinos a year at present, the success of its hands-on management programme is putting considerable financial strain on both the State and donor organisations. This makes the drive away from the present fragmented population structure all the more critical.
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