Group: Use IVF for rhinos

Match-making time: Puntung and Tam (left pic)being put together to see if they are ready to mate and Puntung when she was first caught in Tabin.

KOTA KINABALU: The Borneo Rhino Alliance has suggested that in-vitro fertilisation be done to help in the breeding of the nearly extinct Sumatran rhinoceros in Sabah.

“We can use in-vitro fertilisation if the animals can’t mate naturally,” said alliance head Datuk Dr Junaidi Payne.

He believed that the odds of the rhinos’ survival were not stacked against them if all parties remained focus on saving the animals.

Continuous effort must be taken if the first trial fails, he added.

A report in Oryx, an international journal on conservation, stated that the animal had disappeared from Malaysian jungles while there were only three Sumatran rhinos in captivity in the country.

However, all the three rhinos have problems in their reproductive systems and are unable to breed.

Payne said that poaching was usually the main cause of an extinction of an animal, but it was not so for the rhinos.

He attributed the decline of the rhinos to their low birth rate.

Puntung when she was first caught in Tabin.

Past reports have stated that in-vitro fertilisation had been carried out successfully with animals like pandas in China.

He said that the Government’s decision to discuss the conservation of the Sumatran rhinos with Indonesia could yield positive results if both parties were committed to the cause.

“There are still some 100 rhinos left in Indonesia. There are males and females in this remaining numbers, so the chances of creating baby rhinos are still there, he said.