Amidst frequent heartbreaking stories about disappearing tigers, today there is some great news. India’s latest census has counted 2,226 tigers, a whopping 30 percent jump from the 1,706 documented in 2011. The full details will be released in March.
Between 30 and 50 of those “new” tigers were found in areas not included in prior counts. But most of those gains came from within the best-protected reserves, illustrating what we know about tigers. They are a prolific, adaptable species. They thrive with just the basics: food, water and a large enough place to live. When you add boots-on-the-ground protection, strong laws, enforcement and careful monitoring, they bounce back.
One tiger reserve that has made a phenomenal comeback is Panna, in central India, which received an award today for excellent management. Given the park’s history, it’s quite remarkable. In 2009, Panna’s last tiger disappeared, poached out from under the noses of those supposedly protecting them. The tigers that were later translocated from other reserves have since bred successfully; today about 23 tigers live there.
The country was at a similar juncture a few decades back. In 1971, only 1,800 tigers remained. Two years later, Indira Gandhi launched “Project Tiger” which remains the world’s most comprehensive tiger conservation initiative. At the time of her assassination in 1984, tiger numbers topped 4,000. “Tigers flourished beyond our wildest dreams,” said Belinda Wright, director of the Delhi-based Wildlife Protection Society of India.
But then, during the 1990s, tigers vanished from across the Indian subcontinent in alarming numbers. The seizure of 2,200 pounds of tiger bone (from about 80 tigers) in Delhi in August 1993 made it obvious what was happening: Poaching for the Chinese medicinal trade had hit the subcontinent.
But it was worse than that. This hunting bonanza coincided with a period of unbridled development after Rajiv Gandhi was voted out of office in 1991. “The plunder of India’s forests was in full swing,” remembers Valmik Thapar, one of the country’s premier tiger experts. “Laws, or no laws…it was all about greed.” Forests were razed, degraded and submerged beneath dam floodwaters, pillaged by mining projects and converted for industry and agriculture. Over the past two decades, the country lost a quarter of its wild lands.
History could repeat itself in what has become the tiger’s last real stronghold—and possibly their last best hope for long-term survival: India is home to 70 percent of the entire wild population. There are some disturbing parallels between the 1990s and today. A lucrative market for tiger skins and bones in China is now driving a new spike in poaching. And although substantially fewer tigers are dying now compared with the carnage that wiped out so many of them two decades ago, if proposed government initiatives move forward, ransacking of the country’s remaining wilderness could break previous records.
Under Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s new government, headlong development has become paramount. The election of Modi’s right wing National Democratic Alliance coalition last May sparked unparalleled action to quickly and systematically dismantle the entire legislative framework that protects land, forests, water and wildlife. There are also moves to do away with oversight that could hamper their efforts. “As of now, the dominant influence in the Prime Minister’s Office seems to be that of large project promoters working in the sectors of mining, dams and roads,” says wildlife expert Bittu Sahgal. “They are currently and very directly influencing the government decisions to loosen existing laws, policies and guidelines, to facilitate industrial-scale project clearances at an unprecedented pace.”
It’s the culmination of a debate that has been framed as environment versus growth—just as it is in the U.S. and elsewhere. An example is a Times of India editorial where an infrastructure specialist fueled the fight against laws that some have called ‘green terrorism.’ “We can’t let environmental precautionism be converted into environmental ‘talibanism,’” wrote Srivatsa Krishna. “India’s first priority must be taking care of the energy needs of its people, rather than taking care of sundry animals.”
Powerful industry lobbies and politicians have stoked the myth that “green hurdles”—environmental laws—are strangling the country’s growth, says tiger expert Prerna Bindra. Their position is that “tigers, elephants, et al, are pests,” she says, “and that we need to do away with them so that we can hurtle down the path of growth.” But the rhetoric just isn’t true. In recent years, more than 95 percent of development projects have been green lit. This is simply a land war, fueled by corporate profit—and the needs of 1.3 billion people. India’s last remaining protected lands that provide homes for endangered wildlife cover about 4.5 percent of the country; just 1.2 percent are tiger landscapes. In contrast, 27 percent of US lands are protected.
So the hope is that this celebration of India’s a growing tiger population is not short-lived. “The fact that India has conserved tigers rests on the foundation of a strong legal and policy framework,” says Bindra. “If we meddle with that framework, diluting laws, then it will create serious trouble for wildlife.”
The previous administration did not prioritize conservation, but there was careful scrutiny of projects that could harm wildlife. Now the fight to oppose big projects like dams and mines is getting harder and harder, says Harshawardhan Dhanwatey, co-founder with his wife Poonam of the Tiger Research and Conservation Trust. “These are some of the only places tigers are found. So we’ll fight to the end.”
But for now, let’s take a moment to celebrate the tiger, one of the most magnificent of our planet’s creatures, and to acknowledge the bravery, commitment and hard work of so many men and women that protect them.
No comments:
Post a Comment