Home arrow Network News arrow Network News arrow South Africa: Soft policy on barbaric gin traps
South Africa: Soft policy on barbaric gin traps
A conservation group plans to create a public furore over the government's draft policies on the use of gin traps to control damage-causing wildlife.

Bool Smuts, the founder of the Landmark Foundation, a conservation group, says it is "mobilising a public outcry" against the draft norms and standards for the management of damage-causing animals, which are currently being developed by the Department of Environmental Affairs and Tourism (DEAT).

These, he maintains, do not ban the outright use of gin traps and other leg-hold devices and may even ultimately give the green light to so-called "soft" gin traps made of rubber.

'After 200 years we've seen that these traps don't work'

"We'll be getting people to lodge complaints with the department and we'll make an absolute stink that a government department should even be contemplating norms and standards of this nature, never mind considering enacting it."

The foundation is imploring farmers across South Africa to use non-lethal and holistic measures, including Anatolian dogs and protective sheep collars to protect their livestock from predatory animals instead of resorting to cruel gin traps (a sprung set of steel jaws with serrated teeth), hunting dog packs and indiscriminate poisoning.

These control methods are causing havoc across South Africa as thousands of wild animals are being indiscriminately wiped out.

The government's draft norms and standards represent a "legitimisation of barbarism", says Smuts. "The national department is busy drafting norms and standards which bizarrely enough expressly allow for the use of gin traps … We're against all leg-hold devices. Nothing short of outlawing barbaric gin traps, hunting dog packs and poisons as controls would satisfy us.

"If softening of this is allowed, it undermines very effective, proven, successful non-lethal controls and gives the agricultural and retail sector the legitimisation to continue with their slaughter of our biodiversity. It is beyond us that the DEAT could be legitimising such tools."

'If you're taking out the wrong animals, you actually perpetuate the problem'

Locally, legislation forbids using gin traps, poisons and hunting-dog packs on protected species, including leopard, but non-protected species such as jackal and caracal are viewed as problem animals or "vermin" by farmers and are widely persecuted. Non-target animals are often victims.

Smuts wants SA to follow the lead of 90 other countries that have banned gin traps.

"The thing is these bloody traps are indiscriminate. After 200 years we've seen that these traps don't work. Lethal controls don't understand the dynamics of predation. If you're taking out the wrong animals, you actually perpetuate the problem.

"The DEAT is tasked with the mandate of conserving biodiversity, but in biodiversity terms, it's absolute insanity that the traps are used. It's beyond belief that the department can justify this on ethical terms.

"It holds the leg of wild animals. That usually results in fractures and ligament injuries, and cuts off blood supply. There's the assumption that people check their traps twice a day. I'd like to ask the department how that can be enforced."

Bonani Madikizela, the director of regulation and monitoring services at the department, says the national norms and standards, to be published for public comment in March, are being drafted because there is no uniformity on legislation to curb the problem of damage-causing animals.

The regulations aim to address the "continued use of gin traps and other inhumane methods", he says. It allows for the use of a "legal holding device", which should be determined in accordance with the species and estimated minimum weight of the target animal.

But Smuts laments: "Some of these draft norms and standards are so idiotic, but are in an advanced stage. What's the point of having 'target-specific devices' if you can't determine what target steps into it?"

The government and conservation organisations have been examining whether "soft" gin traps, also called rubber jaw traps, could be a more humane alternative to gin traps.

Smuts disagrees: "These are barbaric and the attempt to rebrand them with rather euphemistic names is a mere green-washing effort. The animals still chew off their limbs and break their teeth trying to free themselves from these devices."

http://www.iol.co.za
 

Sponsored Links