Until recently, the Hluhluwe-iMfolozi Park — proclaimed in 1895 to preserve the world’s last remaining southern white rhinos — was one of the few remaining state-owned sanctuaries in South Africa where visitors could still see significant numbers of rhinos with their iconic horns intact.

Until now, the 96000ha Hluhluwe-iMfolozi Park was home to one of the last significant populations of rhinos in a South African public reserve where rhinos still have their horns intact. (Photo: Ezemvelo KZN Wildlife)

That’s changing. A new dehorning programme, with support from the WWF conservation group, was announced on Tuesday by Ezemvelo KZN Wildlife chief executive Sihle Mkhize.

This follows the killing of 325 rhinos in the province last year, with more than 300 of the animals poached in the 96,000-hectare Hluhluwe-iMfolozi Park alone. The KZN killings accounted for nearly 65% of the 499 rhinos killed nationwide in 2023.

Mkhize said the dehorning operation began on 8 April, in a province where poaching rates had tripled over the past three years.

“It is with a heavy heart that the organisation has decided to dehorn,” Mkhize said. “Rhino dehorning goes against the grain of what we stand for, but the persistent threat posed by poachers has necessitated more drastic measures to protect our rhinos.”

Acknowledging that dehorning was costly and required repeated “trimming” operations every 18 to 24 months as the horns regrow naturally, Mkhize thanked WWF for its “pivotal financial support”.

Read more in Daily Maverick: Two out of three SA white rhinos now in private hands while poachers decimate KZN herds

The agency has been under pressure to follow the example of the Kruger National Park and other government and private sector reserves to dehorn rhinos as one of several strategies to reduce poaching.

Conservation staff use a chainsaw to remove the front horn of a rhino in Hluhluwe-iMfolozi Park. The move follows similar desperate measures in other reserves across the country – including Kruger National Park, where almost 70% of the rhino population was reported to have been dehorned during the 2022/2023 reporting period. (Photo: Ezemvelo KZN Wildlife)

While dehorning has been promoted in several quarters as a drastic but “unavoidable” measure, the latest decision is controversial at both a symbolic and ecological level. This is because their horns are rhinos’ primary defensive tool, while their removal robs tourists of the opportunity to see rhinos in their natural state with horns intact.

The strategy was first adopted in Namibia and Zimbabwe in the late 1980s and early 1990s as a response to the continent-wide poaching crisis and has since been adopted in most of southern Africa.

‘Absolute last resort’

Former Ezemvelo regional ecologist Dr Peter Goodman noted that it was a sad day for rhino conservation and he questioned the wisdom of resorting to such desperate measures.

Goodman acknowledged that dehorning was likely to result in a significant reduction in poaching in the short term — if the entire rhino population in Hluhluwe-iMfolozi was dehorned simultaneously.

However, he noted, the strategy would simply displace poaching to other state and private reserves where rhinos were not dehorned or where dehorning had been discontinued.

He noted that East African rhino range nations viewed dehorning as an “absolute last resort”.

“Kenya, Tanzania and Rwanda are not dehorning their rhinos, yet their populations are still growing.”

“Sadly, the elephant in the room is the lack of law enforcement, political will and legal support. We still see courts releasing rhino poachers on R5,000 bail — and two weeks later they are back poaching in the same reserves.

“The real problem is syndicated crime. This problem is all about security … and corruption. If you have bad actors, the poaching is not going to stop,” Goodman said, noting that only about 80% of a rhino’s horn could be removed safely without damaging the horn growth plate.

As a result, the stumps left behind after dehorning remained economically attractive from a poacher’s perspective.

“I believe we should be focusing instead on sorting out our legal system. We also need more dedicated, honest cops and more effective public-private partnerships among landowners to solve the crisis together.”

Goodman — who was seriously gored by a black rhino in Mkhuze game reserve in 1992 and spent nine days in hospital before recuperating at home for several weeks after surgery — said: “We know already who the main people are. We see politicians… We see rhino horns being smuggled out the country in consular bags.”

Nevertheless, South African National Parks reported last year that nearly 70% of Kruger’s rhino population was dehorned during the 2022/2023 reporting period.

Guardianship strategy

Commenting on the latest KZN dehorning operation, WWF South Africa CEO Dr Morné du Plessis said: “A decision to dehorn is never taken lightly and is only one of a wide range of interventions which together seek to simultaneously remove the potential reward of rhino poaching while increasing the likelihood of being caught.

“The province of KZN has played a critical role in rhino conservation in Africa, which is why we are committing resources towards supporting the authorities in their efforts to protect rhinos. Beyond the dehorning programme, we will also be supporting Ezemvelo in its broader efforts to implement the Ezemvelo KZN Guardianship Strategy for Rhinoceros.”

Read more in Daily Maverick: More than 60% of rhino killings now in KwaZulu-Natal as poachers shift from ‘battered’ Kruger Park

Ezemvelo also committed itself to implementing the recently approved guardianship strategy, which would include:

• Investing nearly R11-million to erect a smart fence to cover a significant portion of the park boundaries where poaching levels are high;
• Financial support of about R40-million by the national Department of Forestry, Fisheries and the Environment to extend the area covered by the smart fence around the park;
• Increasing the numbers of field rangers from 45 to 88;
• Introducing integrity testing among frontline staff;
• Installing trackers in all vehicles;
• Improving relations with adjacent communities;
• Additional helicopter hours and night vision capability; and
• The recent appointment of former section ranger Sthembiso Ndlovu as the senior manager for rhino protection. DM