African Wildlife & Environment Issue 85

EDITORIAL

This issue of your magazine contains many brilliant articles for your reading pleasure, and lots of colourful images of our wondrous biodiversity in plant and animal form. But to single out one article that should be taken very seriously, it is the one about our water storage reservoirs by Dr Bill Harding on page 25. Without water, life becomes difficult, intolerable or impossible, depending on the degree of water deprivation. And many parts of South Africa depend on electricity to move water to where it is needed. Where I live in Johannesburg, water has to be pumped up from the Vaal River basin to the high-lying ground of the Witwatersrand range. Indeed, this water is lifted higher than is the case in most parts of the world. So water and energy are intimately conjoined, and we know that South Africa’s electricity situation is precarious, because of the mismanagement of our state electricity producer, Eskom. A large proportion of our population depends on fresh water stored in ‘reservoir lakes’, and the viability of these vital resources depends on effective management by suitably trained and experienced people. Dr Harding writes: “South Africa lacks human resources skilled in reservoir limnology. The experienced few of us who are left remain disillusioned and can only despair at the mind-boggling recalcitrance to redress this lack of an essential skillset. The failure by the state to recognise and prioritise the environmental health of its man-made lakes has created the scenario in which no training or career opportunities exist for an urgently needed cohort of reservoir limnologists.” Many young South Africans have finished school and cannot find employment. Lots of them dream about going to university to find careers in medicine, law, commerce, the mysterious ‘Fourth Industrial Revolution’ and other glamorous pursuits. But we desperately need experts in limnology and related fields of water management. With elections on our doorstep, I don’t hear our aspirant politicians talking much about water, and I doubt many of them know what ‘limnology’ means. It’s time to wake up, people! During 2023, 499 rhinos were poached across South Africa, 406 were killed on state properties and 93 on privately owned parks/reserves/farms. This was an increase (of 51) in comparison to 448 rhinos poached in 2022.

EDITORIAL

Dr John Ledger

"The pressure again has been felt in the KwaZulu Natal (KZN) province with Hluhluwe-iMfolozi Park facing the brunt of poaching cases losing 307 of the total national poaching loss. This is the highest poaching loss within this province. While KZN recorded 49 arrests and 13 firearms seized, multi disciplinary teams continue to work tirelessly in an attempt to slow this relentless pressure," said Minister of Forestry, Fisheries and the Environment, Ms Barbara Creecy in a Media Release dated 27 February 2024. Readers can find the full text of the Media Release here . Ah yes, that KZN Province, once the shining example to the whole world of a highly successful conservation agency, the place where the White Rhino was brought back from the brink of extinction. Today it is the province with a broken conservation agency (but indisputably an arm of government), and a less than dedicated police force, the province where organised crime and corruption are endemic, where a regional court magistrate with an alleged gambling addiction allegedly took big bribes to let arrested rhino poachers off the hook. And the province where killers for hire seem plentiful and skilled, available to travel anywhere in the country to assassinate anyone, if the price is right.Who dares to speak out in this province where bullets fly like angry bees? The Minister lists some sparse success stories of rhino poaching arrests and jail sentences, but the big picture is one of abject failure to stem the inexorable destruction of our rhino populations. Millions of Rand are being made by trade in rhino horn, yet our government refuses to reconsider the utterly ineffective CITES prohibition of a legal trade in a valuable and renewable product that is clearly in great demand. Those animal rights activists who likewise vehemently oppose the very thought of a legal, managed trade in rhino horn have the blood of another 500 rhinos on their hands. And an organisation with ‘humane’ in its name supports a prohibition policy that resulted in unspeakable cruelty to those poor innocent 500 creatures, yet raises millions of public dollars to ‘fight this cruel trade’. Shame on all of you…

Dr John Ledger Consulting Editor john.ledger@wol.co.za 083 650 1768

1 | African Wildlife & Environment | Issue 85 (2024)