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The IUCN said 2020 was an abnormal year for rhino poaching with Covid confinement and curbs on trade and movement

Poaching and the illegal trade in horns have fallen in recent years but remain grave threats for the rhino’s survival, the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) said Monday.

The Switzerland-based body said 2,707 rhinos were poached in Africa between 2018 and 2021, of which 90 percent were killed in South Africa, mainly in the Kruger National Park.

South Africa is home to nearly 80 percent of the world’s rhinos.

“Rhino poaching rates in Africa have continued to decline from a peak of 5.3 percent of the total population in 2015 to 2.3 percent in 2021,” it said in a report. 

“The overall decline in poaching of rhinos is encouraging, yet this remains an acute threat to the survival of these iconic animals,” said Sam Ferreira, Scientific Officer with the IUCN SSC African Rhino Specialist Group.

The IUCN said 2020 was an abnormal year for rhino poaching with Covid confinement and curbs on trade and movement.

“Global lockdowns and restrictions due to the Covid-19 pandemic saw several African countries experience dramatically reduced poaching rates in 2020 compared to previous years. 

“South Africa lost 394 rhinos to poaching in 2020, while Kenya recorded no rhino poaching that year. However, as COVID-19 travel restrictions lifted, some range states reported new increases in poaching activities – for example, South Africa reported 451 and Kenya six poached rhinos in 2021,” it said.

“These numbers are still significantly lower than during the peak in 2015, when South Africa alone lost 1175 rhinos to poaching.”

The population of rhinos in Africa has fallen by 1.6 percent annually, from 23,562 in 2018 to 22,137 at the end of last year.

IUCN said the number of white rhinos — which it classifies as vulnerable on its Red List of Threatened Species — declined by almost 12 percent from 18,067 to 15,942 during this period.

However, the number of black rhinos — deemed critically endangered by the body — rose by 12 percent to 6,195.

“To support the growth of rhino numbers, it is essential to continue active population management and anti-poaching activities for all subspecies across different range states,” the IUCN said.

Alongside the decline in poaching, data analysed for range and consumer states suggests that, on average, between 575 and 923 rhino horns entered illegal trade markets each year between 2018 and 2020, compared to approximately 2,378 per year between 2016 and 2017.

– 2020 an ‘abnormal’ year –

However, in 2019, before the COVID-19 outbreak, the reported seized weight of illegal rhino specimens reached its highest point of the decade, perhaps due to increased regulations and law enforcement efforts.

“2020 did represent an abnormal year with low levels of reported illegal activity, law enforcement, and government reporting,” said Sabri Zain, TRAFFIC Director of Policy. 

IUCN said the numbers of the one-horned rhino, found mainly in India and Nepal, and the critically endangered Javan rhino had increased since 2017.

“Thanks to conservation efforts including strengthened law enforcement, the number of greater one-horned rhinos in India and Nepal increased from an estimated 3,588 in 2018 to 4,014 at the end of 2021, while the total population of Javan rhinos increased from between 65 and 68 individuals in 2018 to 76 at the end of 2021,” it said.

But the number of Sumatran rhinos fell to an estimated 34 from 47 in 2021, compared with 40 to 78 individuals in 2018.

The IUCN classifies the Sumatran rhino, the smallest of all rhino species, as critically endangered. 

The World Wide Fund for Nature estimates fewer than 80 Sumatran rhinos remain in the world, mainly on the Indonesian island of Sumatra and Borneo.

The IUCN report said 11 rhino poaching incidents were recorded in Asia — 10 in India and one in Nepal —  since the beginning of 2018, all of which involved greater one-horned rhinos. 

“Detection of carcasses in dense rainforests remains a challenge, and there were no reports of illegal killings of Sumatran rhinos despite the substantial population declines recorded,” it added.

Shanghai will switch off decorative lights and video screens on its famed Bund riverfront to save power

Shanghai will switch off decorative lights along its famed Bund riverfront for two days from Monday, city authorities said, in response to a nationwide heatwave that has sent power demands soaring.

Multiple provinces have announced power cuts to cope with a surge in demand, driven partly by people cranking up the air conditioning to cope with temperatures as high as 45 degrees Celsius (113 degrees Fahrenheit).

China has been hit by extreme weather this summer, including record temperatures, flash floods and droughts — phenomena that scientists have warned are becoming more frequent and intense due to climate change.

To save power, Shanghai authorities said in a notice Sunday that they would switch off “landscape lighting” at the Bund, the city’s most famous landmark.

Ornamental lights, billboards and video screens on both sides of the Huangpu River would be turned off on Monday and Tuesday, according to the notice.

The heatwave has reduced stretches of the Yangtze River, China’s most vital inland waterway, to unprecedented drought levels, according to official data.

That has resulted in high pressure on hydroelectric plants that supply power to some of the country’s key economic zones.

In the southwestern megacity of Chongqing, home to 31 million, authorities on Monday declared that all shopping malls must only operate between 4:00pm and 9:00pm daily to cut power costs until the “temperature and supply-demand situation” changes.

The city last week announced industrial power cuts lasting until Wednesday and reduced scenic lighting at tourist attractions.

In neighbouring Sichuan, authorities on Sunday extended industrial power cuts and activated their highest level of emergency response to deal with the heatwave.

“Since July this year, the province has faced the most extreme high temperatures, the lowest rainfall in the corresponding period in history… (and) the highest power load in history,” local authorities said.

Some of the world’s biggest automakers — including Japanese giant Toyota and Elon Musk’s Tesla — operate factories in Sichuan.

The province is also home to parts manufacturers that are crucial to global auto supply chains.

Many major factories were forced to halt work because of the Sichuan power cuts, which were supposed to end on Saturday but were extended to Thursday, Chinese news outlet Caixin reported.

Analysts have warned that Sichuan’s power woes could have ripple effects on the wider Chinese economy and international supply chains.

Hydropower generated in the province supplies domestic consumers and factories, but also industrial powerhouse provinces Jiangsu and Zhejiang.

Shanghai will switch off decorative lights and video screens on its famed Bund riverfront to save power

Shanghai will switch off decorative lights along its famed Bund riverfront for two days from Monday as a nationwide heatwave sends power demands soaring, city authorities said.

Multiple provinces have announced power cuts to cope with a surge in demand, driven partly by people cranking up the air conditioning to cope with temperatures as high as 45 degrees Celsius (113 degrees Fahrenheit).

China has been hit by extreme weather this summer, including record temperatures, flash floods and droughts — phenomena that scientists have warned are becoming more frequent and intense due to climate change.

To save power, Shanghai authorities said in a notice Sunday that they would switch off “landscape lighting” at the Bund, the city’s most famous landmark.

Ornamental lights, billboards and video screens on both sides of the Huangpu River would be turned off on Monday and Tuesday, according to the notice.

The heat wave has reduced stretches of the Yangtze River, China’s most vital inland waterway, to unprecedented drought levels, according to official data.

That has resulted in high pressure on hydroelectric plants that supply power to some of the country’s key economic zones.

They include Sichuan, where authorities on Sunday extended industrial power cuts and activated their highest level of emergency response to deal with the heatwave.

“Since July this year, the province faces the most extreme high temperatures, the lowest rainfall in the corresponding period in history… (and) the highest power load in history,” local authorities said.

Some of the world’s biggest automakers — including Japanese giant Toyota and Elon Musk’s Tesla — operate factories in Sichuan.

The province is also home to parts manufacturers that are crucial to global auto supply chains.

Many major factories were forced to halt work because of the Sichuan power cuts, which were supposed to end on Saturday but were extended to Thursday, Chinese news outlet Caixin reported.

Analysts have warned that Sichuan’s power woes could have ripple effects on the wider Chinese economy and international supply chains.

Hydropower generated in the province supplies domestic consumers and factories, but also industrial powerhouse provinces Jiangsu and Zhejiang.

Children from the El Molo tribe have to take a fishing boat to school

At first light, children from one of Kenya’s smallest and most isolated tribes put on life jackets and board a fishing boat for the journey across the lake to school.

Until recently, they could walk the distance. A road connected the El Molo with the world beyond their tiny village, a lifeline for a secluded community of fishers and craftspeople subsisting on the shores of Lake Turkana.

But three years ago the lake started rising dramatically, lapping at the El Molo’s dome-shaped huts draped in dry fish, then pushing inland, forcing villagers to higher ground.

As the tide reached levels not seen in living memory, the El Molo watched their only freshwater pipeline slip beneath the surface, as well as the burial mounds of their ancestors.

Eventually, the road to the mainland disappeared completely, marooning the El Molo on an island in a lake so large and imposing it is sometimes called the “Jade Sea”.

“There never used to be water here,” said El Molo fisherman Julius Akolong as he crossed the wide channel that today separates his community from the rest of far northern Kenya.

“You could drive a jeep across.”

Turkana, already the world’s largest desert lake, stretching 250 kilometres (155 miles) tip to tip, grew 10 percent in the decade to 2020, according to a government study published last year.

That expansion submerged nearly 800 additional square kilometres (about 300 square miles) of land including around El Molo Bay, where the tribespeople live on Turkana’s eastern shores.

Extreme rainfall over catchment areas -– a climatic event linked to global warming — greater soil runoff from deforestation and farming, and tectonic activity were all cited as contributing causes.

– Blessings and curses –

The phenomenon has profoundly impacted the El Molo, whose distinct Cushitic culture was already under serious threat.

Barely numbering 1,100 in the last census, the El Molo are dwarfed by Kenya’s larger and more prosperous ethnic groups that dominate a country of around 50 million people.

Known as “the people who eat fish” by the livestock-rearing tribes of northern Kenya, the El Molo are believed to have migrated from Ethiopia to Turkana around 1,000 BC.

But few today speak a word of their mother tongue, and ancient customs have evolved or vanished entirely through generations of intermarriage with neighbouring ethnic groups.

The lake’s unexpected rise fragmented the remaining El Molo still following the old ways of life.

Some displaced in the disaster made the wrenching decision to relocate to the mainland, erecting a squatter camp on the opposite shore.

The cluster of shanties on a barren and wind-swept clearing is nearer to the school and other facilities, but a world away from their tight-knit community and its traditions.

“It was very difficult… We had to go and discuss this with the elders so they could permit or bless us to go with no curses,” said Akolong, a 39-year-old father of two.

For those who stayed, life on the island has become a struggle.

The El Molo are skilled fishers, but as Turkana rose higher their people went hungry.

The fishing nets and baskets used for millennia, hand-woven with reeds and doum palm fibre, proved less effective in the deeper water, reducing catch. 

No longer able to access freshwater, the El Molo were forced to drink from Turkana, the most saline lake in Africa.

Children in the village suffer chalky teeth and bleached hair, a side effect of the lake’s high fluoride content.

“We often get diarrhoea… we have no other clean water. This is all we have. It is salty, and corrodes our teeth and hair,” said Anjela Lenapir, a 31-year-old mother of three who decided to stay.

– Disappearing culture – 

School attendance has fallen sharply because parents cannot afford the boat fare, said David Lesas, deputy head teacher at El Molo Bay Primary School.

“Most of them remain at home,” he lamented.

The local government and World Vision, an aid group, are assisting but resources are scarce and needs many in the region, which is experiencing a once-in-a-generation drought.

The school has suffered too: the perimeter fence and toilet block are underwater, and crocodiles have taken over part of the playground.

But the real damage to the El Molo is indelible.

Separated from his people, Akolong has missed initiation rites, naming ceremonies, and funerals — rituals that strengthen tribal identity and community.

“We are now divided,” he said bitterly.

Stone cairns marking the resting place of El Molo’s dead have been swept away, erasing memories of the past, while the lake threatens venerated shrines to tribal deities.

“It is a place that is deeply respected in our culture. With the water rising, we will lose that tradition too,” said Lenapir.

"Black Tail" is up first, taking a few seconds to sniff her surroundings before placing her paws on a lever and zooming away. After storming the finish line, she devours a well-earned Froot Loop that hangs on a "treat tree." 

The girls can’t hide their excitement as they’re brought out to the racing arena.

“Black Tail” is up first, taking a few seconds to sniff her surroundings before placing her paw on a lever and zooming away. 

After storming to the finish line, she devours a well-earned Froot Loop hanging on a “treat tree.”

Black Tail is one of the University of Richmond’s rat drivers — a group that first dazzled the world with their ability to operate tiny cars back in 2019. 

Now, the rodents serve as ambassadors for the school’s Behavioral Neuroscience Laboratory, headed by Professor Kelly Lambert.

“It gets people’s attention about how clever and teachable these animals are,” explained Lambert, who has to balance her affection for the furry speedsters with the need for scientific detachment — naming them only by the Sharpie colors that mark their tails.

The idea of racing rodents started out as a playful challenge from a colleague. 

But far from being a novelty act, the animals are part of a boundary-pushing project exploring the ways in which environmental enrichment sculpts the brain — and could in turn hold potential for solving human mental health challenges.

For Lambert, one of the great failings of modern medicine has been its inability to cure mental illness through drugs, even as pharmaceutical companies have reaped in huge profits.

These pharmaceutical approaches have faced increasing scrutiny since a landmark study published in July questioned the theory that chemical imbalances, especially a lack of serotonin, cause depression.

– Froots of their labor –

Instead, Lambert sees behavior therapy as the key to treating the mind, which is where studying fellow mammals comes in.

“Our brains are changing, from the womb to the tomb,” she said. “If we have some type of engaging life, this is probably important and related to depression.” 

A previous experiment of hers had split rats into groups of “workers,” who were assigned an effort-based reward task of digging through dirt mounds for a Froot Loop — or a control group of “trust fund” rats that were simply handed over treats.

When challenged with stressful tasks, the worker rats persisted longer than those conditioned to remain in a state of what psychologists call “learned helplessness.”

And when tasked with swimming, the worker rats showed greater emotional resilience, as shown by a higher ratio of the hormone dehydroepiandrosterone to cortisol in their droppings. 

Rats that learned to drive also had biomarkers of greater resilience and lowered stress — which Lambert suggests might be linked to the satisfaction of acquiring a new skill, like a human mastering a new piano piece.

“They make pathways that they take over and over again in the wild, and we wanted to see if they could continue to have this great navigational skill in a vehicle,” explained research lab specialist Olivia Harding.

Training wasn’t simple: the team first tried having the rats nudge the driving control with their snouts, before finding the animals preferred to stand on their hind legs and use their front paws.

Early car models required the rats to touch wiring placed in the front, left or right of the car, completing a mild electric circuit that corresponded to movement direction. 

Now, though, they get around in fancier rides with levers designed by a roboticist. 

Even when their cars were placed in an unfamiliar spot, pointed away from the treat, the rats learned to turn their vehicles and navigate toward the reward, indicating advanced cognitive processing at work.

Today’s driving ladies, Black Tail and Multicolored Tail, show clear signs of “anticipatory” behavior when humans enter the room, pacing back and forth and trying to climb their walls.

However, just like people, not all rats have similar interests: while certain individuals seemed eager to drive just for the fun of it, others did so just for treats, while still others couldn’t be coaxed into participating at all.

– Into the wild –

Female rats in particular were long ignored by science, because earlier generations of researchers thought their four-day estrous cycles muddied research results.

This potentially deprived scientists of female-specific insights, a trend Lambert has been adamant to reverse in her experiments — and is also now a required condition for federal grants.

Lambert recognized early in her career that studying rats living “non-enriched” lives inside cages without obstacle courses and activities was of limited use, akin to studying humans in solitary confinement.

In her driving study, rats raised in enriched cages fared far better at driving tasks.

Her most recent paper focused on differences between lab rats and those caught in the wild — finding the latter had larger brains, more brain cells, larger spleens to fight disease, and much higher stress levels than their captive cousins.

“It kind of blows my mind” that there had been so little interest in understanding these differences, given their possible impact on human medicine, she said.

It also raises an intriguing philosophical question: are we more like the caged lab rats, the enriched-setting lab rats, or the wild rats?

“I’m feeling a little bit closer to the provisioned lab rat rather than the wild rat,” muses Lambert.

But the wild rats, who have to scavenge for food and avoid predators every day of their lives — much like our own ancestors — might have something to teach us about mental resilience.

China's searing heat is drying up the critical Yangtze River, with water flow on its main trunk about 50 percent lower than the average over the last five years, state media outlet China News Service reported

A provincial capital in southwest China has dimmed outdoor advertisements, subway lighting and building signs to save energy, official announcements said, as the area battles a power crunch triggered by record-high temperatures.

The mercury has soared beyond 40 degrees Celsius (104 Fahrenheit) in Sichuan province this week, fuelling massive demand for air conditioning and drying up reservoirs in a region reliant on dams for most of its electricity.

Factories including a joint venture with Japanese car giant Toyota in provincial capital Chengdu have been forced to halt work, while millions in another city Dazhou grappled with rolling power cuts.

“Hot and muggy weather has caused the city’s electricity supply for production and daily life to be pushed to its limit,” Chengdu’s urban management authorities said in a notice on social media Thursday.

Faced with a “most severe situation”, the city — home to over 20 million people — ordered landscape illumination and outdoor advertising lights to be switched off in notices issued Tuesday, the statement said. 

Building name signs will also be darkened.

The Chengdu metro said in a video on China’s Twitter-like platform Weibo that it would also turn off advertisement lights and “optimise” the temperature in stations to save energy.

Photos circulating on Weibo showed dimmed lights on metro platforms, walkways and in malls, with commuters walking in partial darkness.

The searing heat is also drying up the critical Yangtze River, with water flow on its main trunk about 50 percent lower than the average over the last five years, state media outlet China News Service reported Thursday.

Sichuan’s power woes could have ripple effects on the wider Chinese economy — the province is a key supplier of energy generated by hydropower to eastern industrial powerhouses including Jiangsu and Zhejiang.

China is battling extreme weather on several fronts, with 23 people killed and eight still missing after a flash flood in the northwest of the country on Thursday sparked by torrential rains.

Weather authorities in the eastern Jiangsu province warned drivers of tyre puncture risks on Friday as the surface temperature of some roads was poised to hit 68 degrees Celsius.

The China Meteorological Administration earlier said the nation was going through its longest period of sustained high temperatures since records began in 1961.

Scientists say extreme weather across the world has become more frequent due to climate change and that urgent global cooperation is needed to slow an impending disaster.

The world’s two largest greenhouse gas emitters are the United States and China. 

But this month Beijing announced it was freezing its cooperation with Washington on global warming in protest at a visit by US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to Taiwan.

A boat carrying tourists weaves through icebergs floating in Disko Bay, Ilulissat, western Greenland

As tourists flock to Greenland to take in its breathtaking icebergs and natural beauty, authorities are mulling ways to control crowds to protect the fragile environment, already threatened by global warming.

“It’s a dream destination,” said Yves Gleyze, a veteran off-the-beaten-track French tourist in his 60s as he arrived at the airport in Ilulissat.

Visitors to the third-biggest town in the Danish autonomous territory are met by a rugged, austere landscape of grey rock and sparse vegetation.

But mesmerising views of massive icebergs come into view after just a short drive.

Breaking off from the Ilulissat glacier in the neighbouring fjord, the majestic blocks of ice drift slowly by in Disko Bay, the occasional whale making an appearance.

The postcard views attracted 50,000 tourists in 2021, more than 10 times the town’s population.

More than half make only a short pit stop during an Arctic cruise.

Numbers are expected to swell with the opening of an international airport in the next two years, a welcome boost to the island’s revenues but also a challenge, given the delicate — and melting — ecosystem.

– ‘Icebergs getting smaller’ –

In the past 40 years, the Arctic has warmed nearly four times faster than the rest of the planet, according to a recent scientific study.

“We can see changes every day caused by climate change: the icebergs are getting smaller, the glacier is retreating,” said mayor Palle Jeremiassen.

Thawing permafrost is also threatening the stability of some buildings and infrastructure.

With the immaculate landscape so coveted by tourists changing,  officials are determined to protect it without turning away tourists.

“We want to control the arrival of tourist ships here,” said Jeremiassen, noting the risks posed by the highly-polluting vessels.

In order to protect the environment and community, Ilulissat should only welcome “one ship max per day, max one thousand tourists per ship,” he said.

Recently, three cruise ships arrived on the same day, spewing out 6,000 visitors.

Jeremiassen said the town’s infrastructure is not designed to accommodate such numbers, nor is it able to ensure that tourists respect protected areas, notably in the fjord.

Nearby Iceland, where the tourism industry has been flourishing for two decades, is an example of how not to do things, he insisted.

“We don’t want to be like Iceland. We don’t want mass tourism. We want to control tourism here. That’s the key we have to find.”

– Small fish –

Greenland has enjoyed self-rule since 2009 but hopes to gain full independence from Denmark one day.

To do so means it would have to get by without subsidies from Copenhagen, which currently make up a third of its budget. It has yet to find a way to stand alone financially, and for now, its main natural resource is the sea.

In Ilulissat, one in three locals live off fishing, which accounts for most of Greenland’s revenues.

But climate change is having a big impact.

“Back when I was young we had pack ice we could walk on,” said Lars Noasen, the captain of a tourist boat as he navigated deftly between iceberg debris in Disko Bay.

“Now the pack ice is not so solid anymore. You can’t use it for anything, you can’t dogsled on the ice and fish like in the old days.”

In the past two decades, Greenland’s massive ice cap has lost 4.7 trillion tonnes of ice, contributing to a sea level rise of 1.2 centimetres on its own, according to Danish Arctic researchers. 

The disappearing ice has affected fishermen.

“The ice conditions are changing. The main fjord used to be closed off by huge icebergs and sea ice and they (the fishermen) were not able to sail in before,” said Sascha Schiott, a researcher at the Greenland Institute of Natural Resources.

Now they can.

Boats are also able to head out fishing year-round now, which has increased fishermen’s hauls.

But the size of the fish they’re catching has decreased, largely due to overfishing, says Schiott.

Ejner Inusgtuk, a craggy-faced fisherman preparing his lines in the port, disagreed and said climate change is to blame.

“The climate is too warm.”