Conservation Issues and WWF-India's Interventions

Conservation issues:

Following are some of the issues in this landscape -

Human animal conflict, with majority being human – elephant conflict due to death of elephants by electrocution, and poisoning and loss of human lives and property.
Poaching of wild animals and extraction of natural resources.
Habitat degradation due to encroachment and agricultural expansion and as a result, loss of corridors critical for migration and long-term survival of wild animals.
Inadequate policy support for wildlife conservation.

Rolling jhum fields

WWF-India interventions:

WWF-India aims to secure the elephant and tiger population of NBL, along with other wildlife for the long term. Some of the ongoing activities are:

Supporting Protected Areas (PAs): WWF is supporting the PAs in NBL for enhanced protection. Gaps in equipments, infrastructure and training needs are analaysed before providing any support. Training of the frontline staff of Forest Department on monitoring tiger and its prey species, anti-poaching combat techniques and legal matters have been provided so far. Logistic support was provided to Nameri and Pakke Tiger Reserves, as well as Orang National Park and Sonai Rupai Wildlife Sanctuary. Awareness activities for the fringe dwelling villagers were also carried out in the adjacent areas of the above-mentioned PAs.
Research: Estimating abundance of tigers in Pakhe Nameri Tiger Reserve; assessing tiger distribution on the Brahmaputra islands; monitoring movement and bahaviour of released rhinos at Manas.
Building professional and public support for conservation of the wildlife and its habitat.
Resolving Human Elephant conflict (HEC): HEC mitigation in Sonitpur district of Assam is going on since 2003. As a result the loss of elephants and human lives has decreased over the past five years. HEC work is also happening in Assam’s Udalguri district, where villagers have been supported the formation of anti-depredation squads. Awareness programs have also been conducted there. The team is also working at a pilot level to introduce biological fencing in Sonitpur district. Here chillies have been planted along the southern boundary of Singlijan Reserve Forest as a biological barrier to prevent elephant straying.
Two critical elephant corridors – Bornadi Khalingduar and Tipi, have been selected for restoration work. Awareness programs to this respect have been carried out and further discussions with the stakeholders are ongoing.
Study on tiger habitats: The landscape team has also initiated collecting and analyzing information on dispersal and use of the river islands by tigers. This will help build strategies to sustain long term viability of the meta-populations of tigers in Kaziranga NP, Orang NP and Laokhowa WLS and Burhachapori WLS. Out of the 52 islands surveyed, tiger presence was recorded from some islands in the vicinity of Kaziranga NP and RG Orang NP.