More than 1,300 rhinos were killed by poachers in Africa… last year, marking a record since 2008, when South Africa banned the trade of horns of a rhinoceros, according to figures from the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN).
“The number of african rhinos killed by poachers has increased for the sixth consecutive year with at least 1.338 deaths of rhinos have been confirmed in the whole of Africa in 2015”, the report says the NGO.
The massacre of the rhino due to the demand for their horns in Asian countries such as China and Vietnam, where it is believed that they have healing properties and are a symbol of prestige.
Rhino horn consists mainly of keratin, like human fingernails, but in Asia it is sold in powdered form as a supposed cure for cancer and other diseases, with a value of $ 60,000 per kilo on the black market. The movement of the horn is run by sophisticated transnational networks of organised crime, reports the IUCN.
The trade of horns of rhino is banned internationally in 1977, but only in 2008 in South Africa, in which it is estimated that they live about 20,000 rhinos, or 80% of the world’s population.
2015, poaching in South Africa decreased for the first time, while in Kenya there has been a fall for the second consecutive year. However, despite increased surveillance by guards, and the alarming increase of poaching goes on in other neighbouring countries of South Africa, such as Namibia and Zimbabwe, and overall in Africa as a continent.
The organizations for the protection of endangered animals estimate that the remaining approximately 20,000 southern white rhinos in Africa, and 5,000 black rhinos, the southern and eastern subspecies. The subspecies of the northern and western black rhino have become extinct, while only three rhinos remaining from the northern white subspecies.
New record for poaching rhinos in 2015
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