According to the latest count, Kaziranga has 2,413 one-horned rhinos and in 2018, five rhinos fell to poachers, according to official data. (Caption: File Photo) According to the latest count, Kaziranga has 2,413 one-horned rhinos and in 2018, five rhinos fell to poachers, according to official data. (Caption: File Photo)

Authorities and wildlife conservationists in Assam are concerned about the detrimental effect on the state’s one-horned rhino after China recently lifted a 25-year-old ban on use and trade of rhino horn and tiger bone- products.

China’s State Council Monday said the ban would be partially lifted to allow tiger and rhino parts to be used for scientific and medicinal research purposes and specified that the products must come from animals in captivity.

In Assam, there is a fear, as explained by multiple conservationists, that the decision might give a boost to rhino poachers and traffickers of horns, who might attempt a spurt in their activities with the hope of laundering the products as legally acceptable in China.

“China’s recent decision is likely to negatively impact other countries as well. Our country shares a border with China and it is well known that the market for poached rhino horns is China. Practically speaking, what was a back-door activity till now might turn into a front-door practice with this decision,” Parimal Suklabaidya, state Environment and Forest minister, told The Indian Express.

“Our government has been successful in its fight against poaching in Assam’s forests and incidents have remarkably gone down. We are prepared to counter any heightened threat,” he said.

Multiple researches and study papers have established that rhino horns poached from Assam land up in China through Myanmar. A report by the International Union for Conservation of Nature last year noted that Myanmar’s Shan state was a “notorious back-door wildlife trafficking hub” through which rhino horns are taken to China.

RB Saikia, Divisional Forest Officer (DFO) of the Eastern Assam Wildlife Division, which forms a large part of Kaziranga National Park, said, “If a market opens up, there will obviously be demand. But for us at Kaziranga, the pressure to fight poachers and maintain vigil is always very high, so I don’t think there will be any immediate increase in threat to the forest.”

According to the latest count, Kaziranga has 2,413 one-horned rhinos and in 2018, five rhinos fell to poachers, according to official data.

Assam’s prominent wildlife conservationist Kaushik Barua said, “Of course, China’s decision will affect Assam’s wildlife. It is a matter of grave concern. Rhino horns patched from here will turn up in China’s markets as ‘legal’ products.”

Rathin Barman, a joint director with the Wildlife Trust of India based in Kaziranga National Park, said, “This is an indirect way to open up markets for poached products.”

The World Wildlife Fund (WWF), in a statement issued on October 29 from Beijing, urged China to maintain the ban, adding that the trade “will have devastating consequences globally”. Although Chinese society is known to attach medicinal value to rhino horn and tiger bones, the WWF statement noted that both the items “were removed from the traditional Chinese medicine pharmacopeia in 1993, and the World Federation of Chinese Medicine Societies released a statement in 2010 urging members not to use tiger bone or any other parts from endangered species”.

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