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Poachers have killed at least five elephants in the Sahel state of Chad, stoking fears for the country's surviving animals, an NGO said Tuesday. The elephants were found slaughtered in the Beinamar area, about 400 kilometers (250 miles) south of the capital N'Djamena, Adam Ahmat Assane, secretary of SOS Elephants, told AFP.

The latest reports from national governments and agencies reveal (so far) that approximately 548 rhinos were poached in Africa last year. Overall, the total is a slight increase compared to 2021, when 539 rhinos were poached. This is a significant change from 2013 - 2017, when more than 1,000 rhinos were killed each year, yet it’s still dangerously high. On average, one rhino is still poached every 16 hours. Most of the rhinos poached last year were killed in Namibia and South Africa. In both countries, poachers have shifted their focus to new places.

Since the beginning of 2022, more than 100 rhinos have been poached in South Africa’s KwaZulu-Natal (KZN) Province. This staggering toll compares to 102 rhinos poached in the Province during the whole of 2021, and 93 in the whole of 2020. Unless this trend is urgently reversed, 2022 could end with a new KZN poaching record, going beyond the horrific 222 rhino poaching deaths recorded in 2017. The recent increase in poaching in KZN is likely due to several factors. First, there has been a devastating decline in the number of rhinos in the Kruger National Park.

Since the first reported pangolin seizure in Nigeria in 2010, the country has seen an explosion in the black market for the world's most trafficked mammal - becoming Africa's hub for the criminal export of pangolin products to East Asia. Use of pangolin scales in traditional Chinese medicines has resulted in Asian species declining dramatically this century.

Two more poachers, caught on South African soil, were sentenced today after they killed an elephant in November 2018 in the Skukuza National Park.

Tragically another white rhino cow and her calf were killed in South Africa over the weekend for their horns, but fortunately two rhino poaching suspects have been caught thanks to an incredible amount of team work.

In South Africa, the COVID-19 pandemic and strict government-imposed lockdown have led to an unexpected consequence: a major decline in rhino poaching. More than 80% of African rhinos remaining in the world are in South Africa, making it the hotspot for rhino poaching. The number of rhinos killed for their horns has been slowly declining over recent years, but the pandemic and lockdown have quelled rhino poaching even more.