Javan rhino extinct in Vietnam

The last Javan rhinoceros on the Asian mainland has been shot dead in Vietnam.

Vietnam's last rhino captured in a camera trap image from July 2004. (Credit: WWF)

THE CRITICALLY-ENDANGERED Javan rhinoceros has become extinct in Vietnam, according to conservationists. The species had been thought to have disappeared from mainland Asia until 1988, when an individual was killed by hunters in the Cat Tien area of Vietnam, leading to the rediscovery of a small population.

But efforts to conserve the remaining Javan rhinos in Cat Tien National Park have failed, experts said. "The last Javan rhino in Vietnam is gone,"  said Tran Thi Minh Hien, director of WWF-Vietnam. "It is painful that despite significant investment in the Vietnamese rhino population, conservation efforts failed to save this unique animal. Vietnam has lost part of its natural heritage."

Genetic analysis of 22 dung samples collected between 2009 and 2010 by a survey team from Cat Tien National Park and WWF, has revealed that they all belonged to a single individual (pictured in the camera-trap photo above), which was found dead in April last year.

WWF and the International Rhino Foundation confirmed today that the animal is now extinct in Vietnam. The critically endangered species is now believed to be confined to a single population of fewer than 50 individuals in a national park in Indonesia.

Victim to poaching

Poaching is being blamed as the primary cause of the species vanishing from Vietnam, with the last rhino discovered dead with a bullet in its leg and its horn removed. Illegal hunting of the animals is driven by demand for rhino horn in Asia, where it is used for traditional medicine.

Conservationists said the ineffective protection of the species in the national park was the ultimate cause of itsextinction in Vietnam, while habitat loss also played a key role. WWF warned that other species, including the Indochinese tiger, Asian elephant and the Tonkin snub-nosed monkey were facing the same fate in Vietnam as a result of illegal hunting, ineffective management of protected areas and pressure on habitat.

Nick Cox, manager of WWF's species program in the Greater Mekong, said: "The tragedy of the Vietnamese Javan rhinoceros is a sad symbol of this extinction crisis. The single most important action to conserve Vietnam's endangered species is protecting their natural habitat and deterring poaching and illegal wildlife trade." He added that the protected areas needed more rangers and better monitoring.

In light of the extinction of the Javan rhino in Vietnam, protection and expansion of the Indonesian population of the species is a top priority. "We must ensure that what happened to the Javan rhinoceros in Vietnam is not repeated in Indonesia a few years down the line," says Susie Ellis of the International Rhino Foundation.