Effects Of Poaching In South Africa

The purpose and focus of this research task is to determine the effect of overfishing and poaching on the biodiversity of South Africa.

Poaching

Poaching is the capturing, hunting or slaughtering of an animal illegally in order to obtain the part of the animal that is considered valuable. The reference of illegally refers to when one does not obtain the correct paperwork and documentation, hunts out of season, killing a protected species or trespassing in order to hunt. Poaching has taken place for many years and occurs for various reasons such as: medicinal, religion, money, demand of items and many more reasons. A large area of concern is the killing of animals because of the demand for a specific feature. A well known case of demand is the

Rhinos are poached due to the value of their horns which are made of ivory and are of high value. The ivory of the rhino horn is used for traditional medicinal practices, used to detect poisonous liquids, for dagger handles and many other uses. Due to the high demand of the Rhino’s horn in the recent years, the poaching levels have increased drastically and have resulted in the mass decrease in rhino numbers. Figure 1: Table on Poaching Statistics (Save The Rhino, 2014)

The image above (Save The Rhino, 2014) shows the recorded number of rhinos that were poached within South Africa and the large increase in numbers from 2008 until the last recorded information on the 30th June 2014.

The impact for the Rhino

The impact of Rhino poaching affects the economy and tourism. South Africa was expected to lose at least 1 rhino per day and with the unrestrained nature of the poaching has caused unsustainable resource consumption, which has restricted the development and growth of the tourism sector within the country. (Fin24,

The Coelacanths are not hugely fished as it is not seen as a good source of food for humans and therefore some local fisherman avoid it to prevent consumers being sick or unhappy.

• Moving further outwards to fish and away from coelacanth territory. o Coelacanths are found close to the coast and within the region where large amount of fishing occurs. There is a history of failing in this idea as international aid donated money to supply fiber glass boats to the local fisherman in the 1980 but as soon as the boast broke down, the fisherman were back in the Coelacanth territory. There has been both success and failure so a solution should be developed that results in high success rates.

• Programs have been developed to encourage and protect population growth. o The South African Coelacanth Conservation and Genome Resource Programme are examples that help discover ways to help further conservation and