![]() Timer said this discrepancy was due to the official population count including any previously recorded rhino as long as it hadn’t been found dead. ![]() ‘Misleading’ population countĪuriga’s report also showed that, every year from 2011 to 2022, with the exception of 2014, the environment ministry reported more rhinos living in Ujung Kulon than the camera traps had actually recorded for that year. Image courtesy of the Ministry of Environment and Forestry of Indonesia. A rhino protection unit discovered the body of a juvenile male Javan rhino in a mudpit in Ujung Kulon on March 21, 2019. The list of missing and dead Javan rhinos reported by Auriga Nusantara. “We would give the camera trap records to the environment ministry (until end of 2019) and the ministry has the authority to decide and release/announce the population number of the Javan rhinos,” Imron told Mongabay in a written statement on April 10. The environment ministry ended its partnership with WWF-Indonesia in late 2019, and the latter has since not been involved with the program. ![]() He said the network of camera traps didn’t cover all of the park back when his organization was still involved in the program. Muhamad Ali Imron, the director for forest and wildlife at WWF-Indonesia, which was deeply involved in the Javan rhino conservation project in Ujung Kulon National Park until 2019, said it was still possible the camera traps had missed some living rhinos. “This is the only remaining population of Javan rhinos and we are in danger of losing this species,” he said. Timer added that his concerns were shared by multiple whistleblowers involved in Javan rhino conservation, who alerted his organization to problems in Ujung Kulon and prompted his team to begin the investigation in September 2022. But he said he would be glad if it turns out the rest of the missing rhinos are alive and have simply been staying out of view of the camera traps. Timer said he believes it’s highly unlikely that live, healthy rhinos would go undetected by camera traps, considering the systematic setup of the devices throughout Ujung Kulon and the fact that rhinos typically frequent the same spots within their home range. Image courtesy of Indonesia’s Ministry of Environment and Forestry. “There’s a political factor at play, especially when the environment ministry has a population increase target for priority species like the Javan rhinos.” Male Javan rhino calf named Luther with his mother. “It’s an unfair glorification from the government for not publishing these losses as well,” Timer Manurung, the founder and director of Auriga Nusantara and lead author of the report, told Mongabay in an exclusive interview on April 7. ![]() By contrast, the government has regularly publicized news of Javan rhino births, signaling a stable population growth. None of these missing and dead Javan rhinos were publicly announced by either the agency that manages Ujung Kulon National Park or the Indonesian environment ministry. Since 2011, when officials started installing the camera traps, the government has reported steady growth from 35 to 72 individual Javan rhinos (Rhinoceros sondaicus).Īccording to a new investigative report, however, the seeming precision of these numbers belies serious problems with transparency, poor management of the species, and indications that the population may in fact be declining.Īmong the key revelations in the report published April 11 by Indonesian nonprofit environmental NGO Auriga Nusantara is that 18 rhinos (nine females and nine males) that have not been spotted alive for years (some since 2019) are still included in the most recent population counts.įurther investigation by Auriga Nusantara found that three of these 18 “missing” rhinos have died: one female in 2019 and a female and a male in 2021. The rhino’s entire population is confined to a single national park, filled with hundreds of camera traps that allow conservationists to monitor sightings of known, named adult rhinos as well as any new births. JAKARTA - Every time a new Javan rhino calf is spotted, Indonesia’s environmental authorities issue an update of the precise population number for the near-extinct species. ![]()
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