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CNN
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It is not easy to transport the world’s second largest land mammals along the way along the world’s second largest continent.
However, on a 3,400-kilometer (2,100-mile) journey involved in crates, cranes, trucks and Boeing 747s, 70 raised, bred southern white rhinoceros from South Africa to Rwanda’s Akagera National Park in early June moved as part of an initiative to “rebel” them.
“Transporting 70 rhinos across the continent is risky,” Martin Rickelton, head of the translocation in African parks, told CNN. So far, the animals seem to be doing well in their new homes. “All reports are good,” adds Rickelton.
Creatures that can weigh more than 2,000 kilograms (over 4,000 pounds) come from a controversial breeding programme launched in the 1990s by property developer John Hume.
After spending years lobbying to legalize the rhino horn trade, Hume was obtained by accumulating horn stockpiles and trimming the animals without harming them.
However, he ran out of money and he sold rhinos in 2023 as horn trade is still banned under international law. He told Agence France-Presse (AFP) when he spent about $150 million on the project. “There’s nothing left except 2,000 rhinos and 8,000 hectares (20,000 acres) of land.”
He did not receive a single bid. African parks — a conservation nonprofit that manages 23 protected areas across the continent — intervened to acquire private symes in plans to “rebuild” animals for over a decade.
The translocation marked the first transcontinental movement of the Sai Reno Wild Initiative in Africa Park.
“This is a very important milestone,” says Taylor Tench, a senior wildlife policy analyst at a nonprofit environmental research agency who was not involved in the relocation. “This is definitely a major development in terms of the efforts of African parks.”
Today, around 17,000 South Whitesides remain in Africa, which are classified as “blackmailed” International Union for Conservation of Nature Red list. This means 2,000 southern white rhinoceros purchased by African parks, and plans to spread across the continent account for more than 10% of the remaining population.
Although international trade in Rihhorn has been prohibited since 1977 under the International Trade Treaty of Endangered Species species (citation), demand from Asian consumers has mistakenly promoted it as a status symbol or cured diseases ranging from hangovers to cancer, it still promotes poaching.
Poachers sometimes killed rhinos completely, sedate them before cutting their horns, or hacked most of the animal’s face to death to cause them to bleed.
In South Africa, where the majority of its population lives, 420 rhinos were poached in 2024. Over 100 people have been killed in the first three months of the year.
Tench says that Rhino poaching has been ramping on the continent from 2012 to 2015, and “many things have been achieved since then.” He added that Kenya lost rhinos last year, causing a significant drop in poaching in Zimbabwe. Today, he says poaching is mainly concentrated in South Africa and Namibia.
To address this issue, Tench says it needs to focus more government resources on addressing the organized criminal network behind Rhino’s poaching and international trade and increasing international cooperation.
Rickelton says there are many future relocation projects at various stages of discussion and planning. He added that there is a strong framework in place to ensure that the rhinoceros are available in place to provide adequate habitat, safety to keep the animals safe, and sufficient funding to care for them.
The move to Akagera National Park required more than half of the planning and approval. And the cost of moving each rhinoceros, including monitoring and management for the next three years, is around $50,000 (the move was supported by the Howard G. Buffet Foundation).
The animals were first moved from the breeding program facility to the South African private game reserve Muniwana Conservancy and were exposed to conditions like red-headed gulp. The rhinos were then loaded into individual steel boxes, driven to an airport in Durban, South Africa, and carefully loaded onto a Boeing 747 by crane.
After arriving in Kigali, Rwanda, Sai made the final leg of the journey on the road. Now, rhinoceros need to adapt to their new environment. They will be monitored by the veterinarian team for several weeks.
According to the park, measures like dog units to reduce poaching were guided to reduce poaching, reducing poaching to “near zero” levels.
There is a reason for optimism. In 2021, the African park moved 30 rhinos from a private gaming sanctuary in South Africa to the Red Fillet. Since then they have had 11 descendants. 70 more rhinos have been added, and “We have now established a genetically viable flock of Rhino,” says Rickelton.
He sees the rhinos from their crate at the end of the journey and says, “The effort, frustration and challenge are really worth it.” Rickelton adds: “It’s a story of hope in a less positive world.”
