Combating Rhino Horn Trafficking: The Need to Disrupt Criminal Networks
Authored by Timothy C Haas, Sam M Ferreira
Date Published: 2016
DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0167040
Sponsors:
World Wildlife Fund South Africa
Platforms:
Java
Model Documentation:
Other Narrative
Flow charts
Pseudocode
Model Code URLs:
http://www4.uwm.edu/people/haas/econecol/
Abstract
The onslaught on the World's wildlife continues despite numerous
initiatives aimed at curbing it. We build a model that integrates rhino
horn trade with rhino population dynamics in order to evaluate the
impact of various management policies on rhino sustainability. In our
model, an agent-based sub-model of horn trade from the poaching event up
through a purchase of rhino horn in Asia impacts rhino abundance. A
data-validated, individual-based sub-model of the rhino population of
South Africa provides these abundance values. We evaluate policies that
consist of different combinations of legal trade initiatives, demand
reduction marketing campaigns, increased anti-poaching measures within
protected areas, and transnational policing initiatives aimed at
disrupting those criminal syndicates engaged in horn trafficking.
Simulation runs of our model over the next 35 years produces a
sustainable rhino population under only one management policy. This
policy includes both a transnational policing effort aimed at
dismantling those criminal networks engaged in rhino horn trafficking D
coupled with increases in legal economic opportunities for people living
next to protected areas where rhinos live. This multi-faceted approach
should be the focus of the international debate on strategies to combat
the current slaughter of rhino rather than the binary debate about
whether rhino horn trade should be legalized. This approach to the
evaluation of wildlife management policies may be useful to apply to
other species threatened by wildlife trafficking.
Tags
Agent-based model
Competition
Management
Dynamics
Market
Conservation
Wildlife
Demand
Legal trade
International-trade