 Reference Base  Entrepots for rhino horn in Khartoum and Cairo threaten G... |
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| Location: |
World |
| Subject: |
Trade |
| Species: |
All Rhino Species |
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Possible origins of rhino horns on the market in Sudan and Egypt. From the hundreds of northern white rhino horns, largely from Sudan, CAR and Zaire which were put onto the market up to the early 1980s, supplies dried up quickly as the decade continued. The flesh white rhino horn seen for sale in Sudan in late 1997 and possibly the two others not seen probably originated from the northern white rhinos in Garamba National Park in the Democratic Republic of Congo. It is also possible that horns still sometimes might appear from the few white rhinos that previ- ously existed or may still exist in southern Sudan, especially in the case of found horn. It is probable that some of these horns have filtered through to Egypt for the small demand in Cairo.
In 1980 there were estimated to be under 400 northern white rhinos and considerably less than 100 black rhinos in southern Sudan (Cumming and Jackson, 1984). By 1983 the world population of northern white rhinos was well under 100, of which 13-20 were in Garamba National Park in Zaire, one or two in Uganda and 12 in zoos. There were doubts whether any remained in the CAR and numbers in Sudan were estimated in the low tens (Hillman and Smith, unpubl.; Hillman Smith et al., 1986). Nine years later, the population in Garamba had doubled, the zoo animals had dropped to nine, they were extinct in Uganda and C.A.R., and there were doubts about the continued existence of any in southern Sudan, although occasional reports of sightings or spoor are still received (Hillman Smith et al., unpubl.). One rhino was seen in the Shambe area around August 1997, according to the Wildlife Conservation Administration in Khartoum. Until 1997, there were regular reports too of white rhinos surviving in the Southern National Park in southern Sudan (Philip Winter, Operation Lifeline Sudan, 1990-1995, pers. comm., 1999). In Kenya, none of the white rhinos (all of the southern subspecies, Ceratotherium simum simum) was poached from 1989 through 1997 and no horns were stolen from white rhinos dying of natural causes. A pair of white rhino horns were stolen from the Nairobi Museum in the mid-1990s and never traced. The source of northern white rhino horn was very limited by this time.
No white rhinos were known to have been poached in Garamba between 1985 and 1995. Rhino numbers rose over this period from 15 to 31 due to good protection. The first confirmed poaching of rhinos there since 1984 occurred in February and March 1996 when two were killed and there were other losses later. Of the horn seen on the market in 1997, it is probable that old horn, such as that found in the bush with horn borer holes, could have come from southern Sudan, but fresh horn is likely to have originated from Garamba National Park.
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