"The Dallas Safari Club, a Texas-based trophy hunting group, has announced plans to auction off a permit to hunt and kill a black rhino, a critically endangered species. Organizers believe the rare permit could fetch up to half a million dollars, which will be donated to fund future black rhino conservation efforts."
"Around 5,000 black rhinos remain on earth, most of them spread through Namibia and South Africa. Hunted nearly to extinction, the black rhino population has declined by 98 percent since 1960, leading the International Union for the Conservation of Nature to classify the animal as 'critically endangered.'
The January 2014 auction will be the first of its kind in the United States, where the import and export of endangered species is prohibited. This past April, however, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service approved the import of a trophy-hunted black rhino for the first time, citing Namibia's promising rhino conservation program."
Christina Wilkie reports for the Huffington Post October 28, 2013.
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