RHINO HORN TRADE: DECADES OF WARNINGS BY ANIMAL PROTECTION ORGANISATIONS PROVEN TO BE ON THE MONEY

In response to valid concerns that increasing the demand for rhino horn by wealthy consumers in Asia (which far exceeds any possible supply from dehorning live rhinos), particularly over the last decade, has led to the killing of rhino and the decimation of many African rhino populations, the international trade in rhino horn is banned under the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES). 

Unquestionably, the devastating loss of thousands of rhinos in South Africa particularly over the past two decades is not only due to the illegal killing of rhinos. These unacceptably high numbers of decimation are also the result of: contentious policy and management decisions; direct involvement of some of South Africa’s professional trophy hunters; corrupt members of the South African Police Service; some rhino breeders; crooked veterinarians and nature conservation officials; and South Africa’s  porous border.  

South African wildlife farmers Johan Kruger and John Hume,   Wildlife Ranching South Africa (WRSA), and the Private Rhino Owners Association (PROA) pushed to open the domestic trade in rhino horn, arguing it was their constitutional right to sell a so-called “renewable resource.”  Dawie Groenewald, a South African wildlife farmer, hunting safari operator and an alleged wildlife trafficker who, is also facing more than 1600 charges related to rhino poaching in South Africa, claimed in an interview with Bryan Christy in National Geographic, that he was the mastermind behind this pro-trade legal battle. Groenewald stated that whilst Kruger’s name was on the court papers, he was the one behind the master plan.  

Dawie Groenewald, his late brother Janneman Groenewald, and their company Out of Africa Adventurous Safaris were indicted in the United States of America on charges of conspiracy, Lacey Act violations, mail fraud, money laundering and structuring bank deposits to avoid reporting requirements.  The Lacey Act makes it a crime to sell animal hunts conducted in violation of state, federal, tribal and foreign law.  Despite facing criminal charges in South Africa Dawie Groenewald his bail conditions seemingly allow for international travel.  This fact was exposed in December 2018 when Janneman Groenewald died unexpectantly while Dawie Groenewald was allegedly in Mozambique. In July 2025 it was reported that community members of Tobere, Kaptutura and Kycia and the beneficiaries of the Tcheku Community Trust in Botswana were up in arms after it was discovered that the District Commissioner’s office had allocated a hunting quota to a company co-owned by Dawie Groenewald.

Kruger, Hume WRSA and PROA fought a legal battle to overturn a 2009 government moratorium on the domestic sale of rhino horn. In 2015/2016 the court found the ban was implemented without proper public consultation and this decision was upheld.  In 2017 South Africa’s Constitutional Court rejected the government’s application to appeal the decision without giving reasons for its finding, opening the door to legalise the domestic trade in rhino horn. Many wildlife protection and conservation organisations believed that the High Court should have afforded the Minister of Environmental Affairs the opportunity to address the public consultation procedural shortcomings of the instatement of the moratorium. 

Numerous international and local conservation organisations submitted formal objections to the proposal to allow the domestic trade in rhino horn, parts, products or derivatives.  It was accurately predicted that given the levels of corruption in some provincial permitting offices, there were concerns that the legal domestic sales could become a conduit for criminal networks to obtain horns which could be smuggled out of the country and sold on the black market.  

Conservationists continue to oppose the legal trade of rhino horn, warning that it increases the illegal killing of rhinos and the trafficking of rhino horn, and thus stimulating a demand for a product that cannot be legally supplied in sufficient quantities. They rightly argue a legal market would complicate enforcement efforts, as it has become harder to distinguish between legal and illegal horns. In addition, conservation groups point to a lack of scientific evidence for horn’s medicinal properties and express concern that a legal trade could lead to the money laundering and the erosion of stigma against rhino horn use.

Confirming these concerns and predictions, a report published in 2024 by the EMS Foundation illustrated that rhino breeders and their industry colleagues have been implicated in the illegal sale of hundreds of rhino horn which has been stockpiled and concluded that this is driving the continued illegal trade in rhino horn. 

Private South African citizens who own rhino and breed with them are legally allowed to stockpile rhino horn from dehorning procedures and from carcasses of rhino who have died naturally, under strict conditions. However, it has been confirmed that since 2016, at least 974kg of rhino horn seized in 11 incidents were confirmed as originating from the theft or illegal sale of horns from legal stockpiles, including both privately-owned and government-owned stockpiles in South Africa.  These incidents represent 18% of all rhino horns seized during the period 2016-2021. 

In 2018 John Hanks published an appeal on behalf of John Hume stating that he was in urgent need of substantial financial support for his captive rhino breeding project. Barely two years later, on the 13^th April 2020 Clive John Melville, a relative of John Hume and Petrus Stephanus Steyn pleaded guilty to charges of possession and transport of 181 rhino horns without the necessary permits, the horns were reportedly destined for South East Asian markets.  Melville also pleaded guilty to forgery for preparing a document that purported to give him permission to possess and or transport he horns on behalf of the buyer, Allan Rossow.

John Hume instituted a court action in an attempt to recover the 181 rhino horns seized by law enforcement officials, which he insisted are his rightful property.  Hume’s application in the North Gauteng High Court in Pretoria to the Directorate for Priority Crime Investigation (THE HAWKS) for the return of 181 rhinoceros horns valued at approximately R10 million failed and was dismissed with costs.   According to Ulrich Roux an attorney acting for John Hume, they have a written undertaking from the National Prosecuting Authority as well as the HWAKS that the horns are in safe custody, as they are exhibits in on-going investigations. 

In 2023 John Hume attempted to auction off his Platinum Rhino breeding project which included approximately two thousand white rhino.  This auction failed to attract a single bid. In the absence of a legal rhino horn trade, Hume’s approach and business model was obviously undesirable and therefore financially unsustainable. According to a published article, the non-profit organisation African Parks purchased the breeding project for a guestimate of less than $13 million. 

African Parks purchased John Hume’s captive rhino breeding operation in 2023 with the sole purpose of rewilding the rhino and their future offspring over the next decade by translocating them to well-managed protected areas across Africa. African Parks with the collaboration of multiple governments, funding partners and conservation organisation has already successfully translocated rhinos.  “Our aim is to de-risk rhinos by establishing up to twenty subpopulations across the continent, each with no fewer than fifty rhinos. It’s no secret that funding for the farm had dried up and that the owner was cutting corners.” When African Parks took over the farm, its experts assessed each rhino and had to implement strict measures to improve the herd’s health.  Rhino Rewild is about the application of rigorous science in the interests of the rhino population, combined with the ethical treatment of individual rhinos. 

In August 2025, eight years after John Hume took the South African government to the Constitutional Court to allow the domestic trade in rhino horn, he is one of six people accused for allegedly being involved in a transnational rhino horn syndicate that has trafficked more than 960 rhino horns between 2017 and 2024. He was arrested after a seven-year investigation carried out by the South African Police Service’s Department for Priority Crime Investigation’s (THE HAWKS) Wildlife Trafficking Section. 

The six accused handed themselves over at the Pretoria Central police station where they were formally arrested. Authorities have alleged that the syndicate used a web of fraudulent permit schemes, exploiting South Africa’s domestic trading regulations under the National Environmental Management: Biodiversity Act (NEMBA) to mask horn exports destined for Southeast Asia, despite international bans under CITES (the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Fauna and Flora).

The five other suspects are reported to be Clive Melville a transport maintenance manager, Izak du Toit described as being an expert in environmental law who has acted for Hume for seventeen years, Catherina van Niekerk the director of a non-profit,  Matheus Poggenpoel an insurance broker and part-time farmer, and Johannes Hennop a game reserve manager. With John Hume they have all been charged with fraud, theft, and contravention of NEM:BA. 

Prosecutors are also reviewing additional serious charges including racketeering and money laundering. One suspect, Clive Melville, who is the half-brother of John Hume’s cousin, was previously arrested in 2019 in one of the largest rhino horn seizures in South Africa’s history, when he was charged with illegally transporting 167 rhino horns on Hume’s behalf. John Hume was granted R100 000,00 bail.

The arrest of Hume and his co-conspirators once again reaffirms the inaccurate and harmful and discredited narrative of the greedy pro-trade lobby and reiterates that selling rhino horn is not conservation and does not protect rhinos. 

Commodifying rhino body parts is not the answer to protecting and saving rhinos – indeed these profit-seeking ideologies are at the very root of the problem. What is needed is a shift toward recognising the intrinsic value of Nature and a total re-think about what conservation should be and what we need to do to ensure wild life well-being. We need to tackle the drivers of rampant biodiversity and species loss, recognising that urgent, transformative, and widespread action is required across all sectors of society to halt and reverse this loss.

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