South Africa sets target for resuming global rhino-horn trade

South Africa, where 79% of the world’s rhinos live, said it aims to come up with a plan by the end of 2030 to dismantle an almost half-century ban on trading the endangered animals’ horns. The proposal, contained in a draft of the country’s first rhino biodiversity-management plan released late Tuesday, is controversial because poaching of the animals for their horns has decimated their populations across Africa. The horns are ground into powder and sold in east Asia where they are falsely believed to cure cancer and other ailments. The country’s environment department will prepare a proposal for a resumption in trade to submit to the national cabinet for approval. It will depend on criteria related to the sustainability of rhino populations. That proposal would then be taken to a meeting of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Flora and Fauna, under which the trade has been banned since 1977. The aim of the plan is that “conditions are met for legal international trade in rhino horn from protected wild rhinoceros, for conservation purposes, to be promoted,” the department said.