Spotter Planes Donated to Parks Board to Combat Poaching.(18 September, 1996)

Two new spotter planes have been donated to the National Parks Board of South Africa (NPB) to combat poaching, mainly in the Kruger National Park. Taiwan is the donor of one of the two-seater planes. Taiwanese ambassador to South Africa, I-cheng Loh, said the world had been falsely accusing his country of providing a market for poachers who slaughtered endangered wildlife for their bounty.

'We are a small Chinese community in East Asia. Red China, Singapore and Japan also use traditional herbs and medicines and these are much bigger communities. We used to use rhino horn as a medicine to bring down high fevers, not as an aphrodisiac,' I-cheng laughed. 'But modern Chinese go to modern hospitals, and herbs, when used, are dispensed in minute quantities,' he said, adding that one rhino horn could last a shopowner for two generations. He said Taiwan did not use ivory for anything, and strict laws guarded the legal import of horns, tusks and endangered species.

I-cheng, together with Dr Robert Cleaves, the president of the US-based Wilderness Conservancy (WildCon), handed the planes over to NPB Chief Executive Dr Robbie Robinson at a ceremony at Waterkloof air force base near Pretoria yesterday. Taiwan donated one plane through WildCon, which distributes assets to conservation bodies around the world. WildCon, in turn, started a collection of its own in the US to donate the other aircraft. By Bobby Brown. Courtesy of The Star .