How The Born Free Foundation and Other Animal Rights Groups Exploit and Threaten Our Wildlife For Profit And Personal Biases.
In the modern era of conservation, few topics stir as much emotion and misunderstanding as trophy hunting. While the issue is complex, involving science, economics, and ethics, one thing is increasingly clear, groups like the Born Free Foundation and similar animal rights organizations have built empires not on facts, but on carefully curated outrage.
By leveraging powerful imagery, emotionally manipulative messaging, and strategically selective narratives, these organizations raise millions from well-meaning donors. Yet behind the veil of compassion lies a stark hypocrisy, one that not only undermines genuine conservation but also exploits and threatens the very animals they claim to protect.
Born Free Foundation and its allies frequently call for blanket bans on trophy hunting in African nations, painting the practice as barbaric and unnecessary. But they conveniently omit that regulated, sustainable hunting is a scientifically proven conservation tool, one that contributes directly to the survival of wildlife and the well-being of local communities.
In countries like South Africa, Namibia, Zambia, Mozambique, Zimbabwe, Tanzania, and Botswana, revenues from controlled hunting fund anti-poaching units, compensate communities for human-wildlife conflict, and provide livelihoods in remote areas with few alternatives. When done properly, hunting quotas are science-based, targeting surplus or non-breeding individuals, and play a vital role in habitat protection.
The truth is clear, without economic incentives to keep wild land wild, it gets converted into farms, mines, or urban sprawl. But this truth doesn’t tug heartstrings the way a bleeding lion or a “last elephant” headline does.
The arrogance of Born Free and similar organizations is matched only by their selective deafness. They routinely ignore the voices of scientists, governments, and rural communities who advocate for sustainable use as a cornerstone of successful conservation.
Instead, they platform foreign celebrities and Western parliamentarians who know little about Africa’s ecological realities but a great deal about influencing public sentiment and fundraising. The result? Policy shaped by Facebook and Instagram “likes” rather than local needs.
Animal rights organizations like Born Free often point to Kenya as a shining example of wildlife conservation, conveniently ignoring its alarming loss of wildlife since it banned hunting in 1977. Kenya is frequently showcased in fundraising campaigns, not as a cautionary tale, but as a supposed model of success. Yet the numbers tell a different story.
In a public Facebook message to Born Free, dated 21 December 2022, I put it bluntly:
“Please correct me if I’m wrong. Kenya is the ‘stronghold’ of the Reticulated Giraffe which, as per your own statement, has experienced a 50% population decline over the past 30 years. How is this possible? By your and your associates’ campaigns, trophy hunting is the root of all evil and the cause of species decline. Yet Kenya banned trophy hunting more than 30 years ago and their giraffe numbers are plummeting.”
Meanwhile, in Southern Africa, where legal, regulated hunting continues, giraffe populations are increasing. Southern Giraffe numbers have reportedly grown by at least 50% over the same period, and possibly much more. In fact, South Africa alone has seen its large mammal populations increase from around 500,000 in the 1960s and ’70s to more than 20 million today, thanks in large part to private wildlife ownership and the sustainable use model that includes hunting.
And Kenya? Studies suggest it has lost 75–90% of its wildlife since banning hunting, depending on species.
Born Free is fully aware of these statistics. Yet rather than confront them, the organization uses such losses as tools to attract more donations, highlighting the decline of the Reticulated Giraffe, for example, without acknowledging how Kenya’s preservationist, exclusionary approach may be contributing to that very decline.
The real tragedy is that conservation models excluding rural communities and economic use often end up undermining the very wildlife they intend to protect.
My public Facebook message continued:
“Maybe the cause of plummeting wildlife numbers is not sustainable use, which includes trophy hunting, but rather the narrative you peddle—bans, and the preservation model at the exclusion of indigenous people and rural communities.”
Born Free and others also ignore the dismal track record of international bans. Ivory trade has been banned since 1989 and rhino horn since 1977, yet poaching continues and populations remain under threat. These bans haven’t stopped poaching. They’ve just pushed trade into the hands of criminals and given animal rights organizations a fundraising bonanza.
While these organizations campaign to ban the import of legally hunted trophies from Africa, they are conspicuously silent about the UK’s own hunting traditions.
The UK allows deer stalking, bird shooting, and fox hunting (albeit in controversial and sometimes legal grey zones). In Scotland, tens of thousands of red deer are culled annually, often shot for sport and ecological balance. Game bird shooting is a billion-pound industry. Where is Born Free’s outrage over this?
Why is it acceptable to manage animal populations through hunting in the UK, but “immoral” when African countries do it?
This double standard reeks not just of hypocrisy but of neocolonial paternalism. It sends a message that African nations are incapable of managing their own wildlife, despite decades of evidence to the contrary.
Behind the emotive campaigns and shocking visuals lies a lucrative industry. Born Free’s fundraising strategy thrives on crisis narratives. The more dire the situation appears, the more donations flow. But where does the money go?
A significant portion funds lobbying, marketing, and administrative overhead. Very little, if any, directly supports the communities or ecosystems where the supposed “crisis” exists. In fact, by promoting bans that destroy incentives for conservation, these organizations often leave habitats and species worse off.
And yet, they face little scrutiny, shielded by a public perception that they are champions of animal welfare. A public that can’t differentiate between animal welfare, animal well-being and animal rights. While they and the media portray them as “conservationists.” At best, they are “preservationist”, worlds apart to those that understand the ecological difference.
The consequences of these anti-hunting campaigns are far from theoretical. In countries where hunting has been restricted due to external pressure, former conservation land is often lost. Communities lose income. Poaching rises. Wildlife numbers decline. I was horrified to learn that Kenya has all of 51 Sable Antelope and the grand total of 15 Roan Antelope left. Antelope found in their thousands in countries that conserve their wildlife on a sustainable model.
In Born Free’s “Adopt a Rhino” campaign, Born Free claims, “Several threats are edging rhinos closer to extinction.” And then goes on to name them, “illegal hunting for sport and poaching for their horns.” I can only assume “illegal hunting for sport” must be legal trophy hunting as Born Free’s adoption claim is that the money raised will have a “massive impact” helping Born Free “lobby governments and campaign against trophy hunting and the rhino horn trade.”
Of the five species of rhino the three Asian species survival is literally hanging on by a thread. According to the peer-reviewed International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List of Threatened Species, these three species are not trophy hunted but are teetering on the brink of extinction because of:
Javan Rhino – “the effective carrying capacity of the area.
Available rhino habitat is limited by two major factors: (1) the threat of human encroachment and (2) the predominance of a palm species (Arenga obtusifolia), …Arenga dominates the forest canopy in many locations, and inhibits the growth of rhino food plants… Where Arenga palm dominates, little else grows.”
The Greater One-horned Rhinoceros “declined to near extinction in the early 1900s, primarily due to widespread conversion of alluvial plains grasslands to agricultural development, which led to human-rhino conflicts and easier accessibility for hunters. Sport hunting became common in the late 1800s and early 1900s. A reversal of government policies shortly thereafter protected many of the remaining populations. However, poaching, mainly for the use of the horn in Traditional Asian Medicine, has remained a constant threat ….. but in the past 5 years, poaching has decreased and the populations in these areas are increasing.
However, not all recent population decreases can be linked to poaching. There have been serious declines in quality of habitat in some areas. This is due to: 1) severe invasion by alien plants into grasslands affecting some populations; 2) demonstrated reductions in the extent of grasslands and wetland habitats due to woodland encroachment and silting up of beels; and 3) grazing by domestic livestock.
In Chitwan National Park, poaching alone does not account for the observed level of population decline, and there are trends in a number of reproductive indicators (i.e., decline in the percentage of adult females calving and in the percentage of the population that is calves) that are strongly indicative of negative changes in habitat quality. In Chitwan, there has been severe infestation of some riverine and grassland areas by the climbing Mikania micrantha (which covers over indigenous vegetation), and invasion of Eupatorium in other areas. There is also heavy livestock grazing pressure and disturbance in buffer zone areas as well as some invasion of grasslands by Acacia catechu and Dalbergia sissou.”
Sumatra Rhino – “three principal threats across Sumatra are small population effects (e.g., the Allee effect), human disturbance, and poaching. The species is now so reduced that there are very small numbers in each locality where it still survives.”
By contrast, this is what the IUCN Red List and a joint report titled “African and Asian Rhinoceroses – Status, Conservation and Trade” by the IUCN and TRAFFIC for CITES say of the two African species of rhino.
“In South Africa and Namibia, the two countries with the largest rhino populations in Africa, numbers of both species of rhino have increased considerably since sport hunting of white and black rhino resumed in 1968 and 2005 respectively.”
With specific reference to the White Rhino the important role of trophy hunting is reported
“Hunting continues to play an important role in white rhino conservation through the revenue it generates, as recognised by the 2012 IUCN World Conservation Congress and national rhino management plans in South Africa and Namibia, the two range States with the highest numbers of black and white rhino which together conserve 87% of Africa’s rhino.”
It then goes on to caution the negative impact bans could have.
“Measures that have been introduced to restrict trophy hunting, such as hunting trophy import bans by some countries and refusal of certain airlines to transport trophies, has the potential to negatively impact on African rhino conservation by reducing revenue generated through this source.”
“Until recently, at the continental species level, poaching of White Rhinos has not had a serious impact on overall numbers of White Rhinos in Africa, with poaching losses in parts of the range being surpassed by encouraging growth rates in others.”
“While Black Rhino numbers continue to increase at a continental-level poaching has slowed overall growth. Some populations have also declined. Black rhino poaching peaked in 2015 and has been declining since.”
A stark warming which is echoed for both the Black and White Rhino by some of the world’s leading scientific wildlife experts is:
“The significantly increased poaching since 2007 has greatly increased protection costs and risks to investment and staff. This has resulted in reduced incentives. Some private owners in South Africa have got rid of their rhino. If this worrying trend continues this threatens to possibly reverse the expansion of range and has the potential to also reduce conservation budgets and incentives to conserve” Rhino “both those privately owned and those managed for the state on a custodianship basis (due to declining live sales and greatly increased protection costs ).”
Via email I asked Born Free Foundation and their CEO Will Travers for comment on my debunking of their “Adopt a Rhino” campaign, sadly by the time of publishing, among others, my:
“Your constant call for banning trophy hunting against overwhelming scientific evidence to the contrary of the value of trophy hunting to species conservation and the benefits to communities is a direct threat to species survival and community livelihoods. You are misinforming a caring, groomed public. Your focus seems to generating and profiting from donations and not species conservation.”
was only graced with a “read receipt”.
By attacking sustainable hunting, Born Free and its peers aren’t saving animals, they are dismantling one of the few models that has demonstrably worked for both people and nature in Africa.
Animal rightists ridicule and mock proponents of regulated hunting by asking the often repeated question “how can you save a species by shooting it?” Are they honestly so pigheaded and arrogant in the importance of their own beliefs that they will risk species survival against overwhelming scientific evidence to the value and benefits to species survival and community livelihoods. Firstly hunters aren’t shooting a species, they are hunting an individual animal usually past it’s prime in order to save the habitat the species needs for survival. The three Asian species of Rhino highlight why the three species are in dire straits, loss of habitat.
It’s time for the public, and policymakers, to demand greater accountability from animal rights organizations that prioritize ideology over evidence. Conservation is not a one-size-fits-all endeavour, and imposing Western values on African realities is not only ineffective, it is damaging.
If Born Free and others truly care about animals, they should support African-led conservation initiatives, listen to local voices, and back strategies that actually work, even if they don’t fit into a sanitized, Disneyfied narrative.
The animals deserve more than emotional manipulation. They deserve truth, science, and sustainable solutions not the Born Free Foundation’s adoption gimmick of “your own cuddly toy to keep at home.”
Trevor Oertel
SUCo-SA
