Mixed fortunes for the world’s rhino species

Posted on November, 11 2015

For the third time since 2011, Nepal has gone a year without losing a rhino to poachers.
For the third time since 2011, Nepal has gone a year without losing a rhino to poachers. This success is based on political will, the dedication of rangers and conservationists, and the active involvement of communities, and has contributed to a 21 percent rise in the country’s rhinos over the same period. Globally, effective conservation has seen greater one-horned rhinos increase to 3,555, including 645 in Nepal. The Javan rhino population has  also inched up to 60 with recent births providing renewed hope.

However, the slaughter of rhinos in South Africa continues with 749 poached by end August – higher than at the  same stage last year. And the Sumatran rhino is now in real peril. Extinct in the wild in Malaysia, there are fewer than 100 in the wild in Indonesia.
Dr Jacques Flamand of WWF’s Black Rhino Range Expansion Project has just administered the antidote to wake up a black rhino which has just been released on to a new home after an epic 1500 kilometre journey.
© Michael Raimondo / WWF

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