Nat Geo's story of 2000 rhinos - and what farming endangered species really means

A few days back, I read an article in National Geographic on an attempt to combat poaching by farming endangered rhinos (and other animals I believe) and how it all went wrong. If you have not read the article, and don't intend to, here's a short synopsis : an entrepreneur in South Africa came to the idea that poaching could be stopped by providing the "goods" - in this case rhino horns - through farming rhinos, cutting off the horns (which do apparently grow back) and selling them. Needless to say, things did not work out as planned, and now, 15 years down the line and about 2000 rhinos on the farm later, his finances have reached their limit, and he intends to auction his farm off online this month.

This is not the first time that animals outside the domesticated species have been farmed in connection to something humanity feels they can provide. And the attempts have their supporters and detractors both - these two articles, for instance, delve into the idea of farming as well as a specific case study. While these articles are relatively old - from 2015 and 2016 respectively - and therefore not using the newest findings, I used them for a reason - because they show that the conversation on farming yea or nay existed then already, and is anything but brand new. In wildlife matters, there are two ways of presenting a topic : either as something completely new or something that has been going on for ages, and the trouble with both is that it tends to negate or ignore any number of things that are happening or have happened, for better or worse, that could be informative to us; in the case of tigers, for instance, while the problem of tigers being endangered, poached and occasionally farmed is indeed not new, it is an active situation where much happens without the wider public ever really becoming aware of it, because wildlife crime and illicit wildlife trade rarely make news in the same way as human on human crime does; equally, as the world changes, new challenges and new solutions show themselves that, also, tend to be overlooked. The result, I think, is that anything wildlife related can lead to a certain amount of disbelief, but also inertia due to oversaturation with the same presentation of the problem - and such an oversaturation can very quickly make people despondent, as it ends up suggesting that whatever we do, we are dealing with a problem that cannot be solved. Equally, as the new report on Global Initiative Against Transnational Crime discusses at the very beginning, "Narratives have concentrated largely on the ‘war on poaching’ and how wildlife trafficking generates income for terrorist groups. This focus has led to overly militarized and tactical responses that have missed the real threats and challenges of wildlife crime and have broken down trust and the legitimacy of conservation efforts." (From the report, by Alastair Nelson, end quote)

So from all this, one thing is certain - wildlife crime and illicit wildlife trade, much like everything else we humans tend to do, concentrates on a narrative. And a problem with a narrative is that it is a story we tell about something; and as a story, the key points and important factors may become victims of what is good for the story thinking, may be perceived as of lesser importance than the flow we use to elicit an effect in our audience.

For myself, as an anthropologist, I can say that the following is my conclusion where farming yes or no is concerned:

• while farming may indeed seem like a great idea, we know that all farming, and including and perhaps especially farming of wildlife, comes with challenges, and may also be cruel and dismissive of the welbeing of the animals in question, be it battery chicken farms or bear farming in China and elsewhere in Asia
• the farming can be interconnected with poaching/wildlife crime/illicit wildlife trade (for an example, see the previous link); as such, it does not work to reduce them, but essentially "joins in"
• this problem may also lead to even further stress on the (often endangered) species and the environment, as there may be demand for the supply for numerous farms on top of the usual demands
• it does nothing to dispel myths surrounding the products of these animals, often considered medicinal, but with little to no data supporting the theories, not to mention poor quality control; this means that the use of the animal parts continues to be present as a nod to one's broader cultural identity and may be politicised as a "unifying act", portraying detractors as unpatriotic or dangerous to a country, ideology or political or religious system
• the farming may not solve the problem as there may always be a desire for wild animals instead; it will also feed into the feeling that using those animals is ok, and may reduce attention we afford the numbers poached from the wild

The bottom line is this - while farming may seem like a logical idea, it is neither well developed nor subject to laws regulating how animals on the farms are treated (at least to my knowledge); it is also unlikely to help the wild populations recover, while possibly even co-contributing to the wildlife crime/illicit wildlife trade. Unfortunately, even steps that seem to make sense don't necessarily provide the desired solutions, especially when aggravating factors, such as poverty, but also a demand for a specific and specifically procured product vs an alternative, play a role.