Pieter's Blog

South Africa has led the field of “conservation”, or so they say, by placing wildlife species in private hands. With the tremendous growth in game farms (largely as a result of environmental destruction by previous cattle ranching on those lands), there was a significant demand for wild species. These animals were supplied by auctions among the private owners as well as the State selling “surplus” wild animals to private individuals.

In the case of rhinos, this scheme of private ownership has been hailed as a great conservation success. There is frequent mention made of the great increase in both black and white rhino numbers since they were placed on game ranches. Indeed, the overall rhino numbers in South Africa now exceeds 22,000 animals, and a significant percentage of these animals are in private hands.

However, it is questionable to what extent such “private” rhinos contribute to conservation of the species. These animals are virtually all bought, sold and traded much like domestic cattle, and only exist because of the commercial value they represent to their owners. Owners had in the past two main options to profit from rhinos on their land – photographic tourism and trophy hunting.  Now, however, there is the option of selling horns, and there is a move among private owners to call for legal trade in horns given their rising monetary value in Asia.

South Africa already has an established legal trade in rhino horns and trophies;  for example, CITES trade records indicate an increasing trend in SA horn exports (17 in 2007, 16 in 2008, 90 in 2009, and 158 in 2010 – note that 2010 numbers are all preliminary at this stage since records are still being compiled). Where are the horns exported to? Many different countries, but increasingly to Vietnam (2 in 2007, 2 in 2008, 62 in 2009, and so far 93 in 2010). It should also be noted that Vietnam is becoming a major destination for rhino hunting trophies. This is strange as Vietnam (unlike let’s say the USA, Spain, Russia, and France) is not known as a country with many avid trophy hunters. It should have been clear long ago to those who issued the permits that these were all “pseudo” trophy hunts – the price that could be fetched for the horns once they arrived in Vietnam far exceeded the trophy hunting costs. Indeed, it has been reported that many of the “trophy hunters” who arrived to collect their rhinos on permit had never shot a gun before and relied on the accompanying “professional” hunters to shoot the rhino for them.

Basically, South Africa opened the floodgates by engaging in legal commercial trade of rhino horns and hunting trophies with countries like Vietnam. At a very basic level, economic theory involves supply and demand. We all know the situation is more complicated than that, and we can also say that fuel feeds a fire. Indeed, there is a direct relationship between the increased trade in rhino horns and “pseudo” trophy hunting with an increased level of poaching (83 rhinos poached in SA in 2008, 122 in 2009, 333 in 2010, and 448 in 2011). Once a supply is established, the demand grows by whatever means of delivery.

So how does this affect lions?  Well, what we are seeing now from CITES, SA lion export records are parallel to what was seen for rhinos a few years ago. Lion bones are increasingly important to the Asian traditional medicine trade – largely because the tigers that used to supply bones are now a bit thin on the ground. In recent years, South Africa has replied to this demand. In 2009, 250kg of lion bones were exported to Laos, followed by 556 bones in 2010. As these are CITES export records, we cannot tell you how 566 individual bones correspond to 250kg of bones, but only report to you that very few bones were exported to Laos before this date.  In 2010, 14 live lions were exported to Vietnam – why? In 2010 (so far- see above for reliability of these recent numbers) 29 skeletons went to Laos and 19 to Vietnam. Laos received 90 lion teeth and 6 skulls in 2010, and the numbers will increase.

Also worrying and similar to the rhino scenario – Laos has now become a lion trophy hunting country. Yes indeed, Laotians have discovered a very recent desire to go to South Africa to “hunt” lions – 43 trophies so far were exported in 2010 versus zero trophies in all previous years. Reminiscent of the Vietnamese rhino hunters?

The South African authorities at the Department of Environmental Affairs tell us this is all above board and largely represents bones from lions in captive breeding programmes (canned lions). We say the demand has been fuelled, and since history tends to repeat itself, we might begin to see an upsurge of lion poaching incidents parallel to current rhino poaching.

Our message to South Africa? Please do not allow yourself, legal as you might claim it is, to get engaged in exports to Asian countries demanding lion bones and derivatives.  It will stimulate an illegal market involving wild lions in all African range states. It will promote poaching of lions as it has stimulated poaching of rhinos by allowing exports to fuel Asian markets – and that market for African wildlife products is insatiable. It might be said the bones derive from captive bred lions, an industry promoted to satisfy trophy hunters by shooting lions in enclosures. Well done for commerce. 

 Asian markets used to be supplied by Asian species. Those are now gone, lost, poached to extinction, and Asia has turned to Africa. Asian markets put a premium on wild animal products as they are “stronger” than captive raised animals. Remember that the “tiger farms” in China raise animals under deplorable conditions to be killed for the medicine market much like  lions are raised under deplorable conditions to be killed for the hunting market.  And finally, remember that there are as few lions on the African continent as there are rhinos in South Africa alone.

Please click on this link to see a country by country assessment of lion trophy hunting for African nations that permit(ted) the practice. This is the most up-to-date analysis, and includes CITES export numbers, threat assessments for lion populations in each country, a summary statement for each country, and a conclusion on trophy hunting offtake.

Please bring this report to the attention of members of Congress, Senators, Members of Parliaments, and Members of European Parliament who represent you. It is a document that all decision makers need to see to end lion sport hunting. We need your active participation to circulate this report. Thank you.

Picture Credit : Chris Harvey

 In preparing an overall trophy hunting report for Africa, I was again reminded of some very strange happenings in South Africa. It has to do with the numbers of “wild” lion trophies exported over the past ten years, and the paltry few lions available to make up such exports. Let me explain.

South Africa, according to various reports, has anywhere between 2130 and 3852 wild lions. In case you should be worried, all these lion populations are behind fences. There have been a number of “private reserves” established, one of them next to the Sun City entertainment resort, where lions have been introduced from Namibia to add entertainment to game drives. Then there are a few National Parks with lions - notably Kruger that boasts over 2000 lions within the very large reserve. And then of course there are “game ranches” that offer lion hunting, but these are all derived from a captive population of well over 4000 lions specifically bred for trophy hunting. CITES (the Convention on Trade in Endangered Species of Fauna and Flora – a watchdog organization that is supposed to strictly regulate trade in endangered and vulnerable species and that is about as effective as an umbrella in a hurricane) therefore has two categories of lions exported as trophies from South Africa: “ranched/captive bred” and “wild”.

Now if you should happen to peruse the CITES trade website (perhaps when there is nothing good on TV) you will see that South Africa exported a total of 2651 “wild” lion trophies between 2000 and 2009 when reliable records end. This is a puzzlement. You see, South Africa just does not have that many wild lions in hunting concessions. Sure, some of the concessions directly bordering on Kruger Park allow trophy hunting (good deal, they took down the original border fence between Kruger and the concession, so wildlife flows in and out – one minute in a hunting area, next in a protected area). Also, some of the private reserves allow trophy hunting of their excess lions (not advertised to the tourists). But that, really, is about it.

There is not much of a price difference between hunting a canned lion versus a “wild” lion, but “real” hunters turn up their noses at any lion that has a sniff of captive breeding – they want what they are promised – a wild one, and not a “wild” one within the past 2 or 3 days. South Africa has fast and loose designations – according to their regulations, any captive bred lion turned loose in a field with a few antelopes is “deemed” to be wild. So last week it was a captive animal and a few days later it is wild. Quite convenient.

But let’s give the hunters the benefit of the doubt. Are there any “wild” lions to be hunted in South Africa? In any truly wild population, about 15% of the lions are adult males, about 35% adult females, and the rest subadults and cubs. So if you take the wildly optimistic figure of 3852 wild lions in South Africa, that means only 578 are adult males. Then say that optimistically that 5% of those males occur in hunting concessions (contiguous with National Parks) -  so 29 males provide an average trophy offtake over the past ten years of 265 “wild” trophies per annum. I should point out that South Africa also exported 3024 “captive/ranched” lion trophies over the past ten years to 2009.

You are by now beginning to get my point. A famous parallel could be made with Burundi, a densely populated country that perhaps had a handful of elephants (some say one). From 1973 to 1982, 300 tonnes of ivory were exported from Burundi to Belgium (before the 1990 ivory ban). Later, Burundi was allowed to export another 89.5 tonnes of stockpiled ivory by CITES. Quite amazing how so few can provide so much.

So where do all those “wild” lions exported from South Africa come from? There are three explanations. The first is that those lions are regularly placed in South Africa by aliens from a distant planet. We can sort of dismiss that possibility with apologies to those who firmly believe aliens walk among us. The second is that the lions are hunted illegally in neighbouring countries like Zimbabwe and Mozambique and declared in South Africa as resident lions. That has some degree of possibility. For example, there is evidence that in 2007 19 lions were shot but official CITES export numbers from Mozambique show only 15 exported from that country. In 2008, trophy fees were paid for 22 lions, but only 18 exported from Mozambique. The third, and most likely, is that captive bred lions are sold to clueless clients as “wild” lions. It’s quite easy really – bring a client to a hunting “concession”, let him slog around for many days, secretly buy a lion from a breeder, set it out in the area, and then lead the client to it. Presto chango and the rabbit comes out of the hat. Virtually every single lion hunted in South Africa was bred in captivity. Going home and boasting you went on a “dangerous game” lion hunt in South Africa and registering your “wild” trophy for the SCI record books is a fallacy and a delusion. 

It is a wonderment that CITES and other relevant authorities have not picked up on this discrepancy. I will surely lose sleep over all those poor clients (71% of South African “wild” lion trophies end up in the USA, a country seemingly stuffed with gullible hunters). South African operators and professional hunters have played you well. Caveat emptor for all you credulous clients who will doubtless flock to the next SCI convention in 2012 and sign up for some more “wild” lion hunts in South Africa. Those of you with “wild” trophies, perhaps consider a lawsuit for having been sold falsely advertised goods, and SCI – take all those “wild” lions hunted in South Africa off your record books, recall your awards and rings and whatever other honours you bestow. You have all been duped.