Who will win the battle?

Who will win the battle? Elephant or man?

Dr.T.P.Sethumadhavan
Over the years for many reasons our forest cover has shrunk. Poachers are taking a toll on elephants. Now elephant is an endangered species. This is a serious issue. The Asian elephant, the symbol that once adorned flags and ancient temple grounds is being forced out of its forest home by logging, agricultural clearance and ill-planned development schemes.
From Indus valley to Ajanta caves, elephants lent wings to man’s artistic imagination. They expanded the horizons of literature in the writings of Valmiki, Vyasa and Kalidasa. Contrary to the elephant’s philosophy, they even went to the battlefield. Ideals of Ganesha, the elephant-headed God, with his plump human like body, are found throughout Asia in village homes. His head is sometimes adorned with jewels. Still worshipped as a god and honored as a scribe from India to Japan, this beleaguered animal is also relentlessly hunted for its ivory, leaving many populations with few, if any, male elephants. Poaching for ivory, which is only found in male Asian elephants, is severely affecting the sex ratio in some areas, notably south India, Cambodia and Vietnam.
Asian elephants live in the region of the world with the densest human population, which is growing about 3 per cent a year. Clearance of forests for settlement and agriculture is disrupting traditional elephant migration routes and leading to violent clashes between humans and animals when hungry elephants raid crops. The Asian elephant specialist group of the IUCN describes the current distribution of elephants in North, South, East and Northeastern forest divisions. Estimated population of elephants in the country according to Karnataka Forest Department (Census 2001) is around 28729. Of which more than 50% elephants are in South India. Continuously growing human population of tropical Asia has encroached upon the elephant’s dense but dwindling forest habitat. About 20 per cent of the world’s human population lives in or near the present range of the Asian elephant. Absence of good data and the difficulty of counting elephants that live in thick tropical forests means that it is almost impossible to quantify the decline in Asian elephant numbers.

The activity that is of serious consequence is the poaching of the male tuskers. Sex ratios in some parts of the elephant range reduced to even1: 90. While poaching has depleted the male population, the female population has been increasing over several decades. This leads to overabundance of elephants especially in the protected areas, which can have adverse impact on vegetation thus increasing human-elephant conflict. The major conservation problem today remains the exploitation of elephant habitat due to its fragmentation and degradation.

For the rural poor, whose life is a daily battle for economic survival, elephants can be a dangerous problem. Unless the damage they cause is adequately and promptly compensated, it is quite obvious that elephants and other wildlife will decline and eventually disappear from agricultural areas. Communities living in proximity to elephants can be hired as trackers, rangers, elephant drivers, and trainers at a fair wage scale comparable to employees hired from outside the region. Moreover long-term residents could also be trained and employed in protected area management, thus exploiting the opportunity for combining traditional knowledge with sound modern conservation approaches. Revenues from Ecotourism could be shared with communities through a direct percentage of return, or through employment in the tourism industry.

In order to protect existing protected areas we need to ensure that forest guards and national parks personnel have adequate salaries, equipments and infrastructure to provide effective protection for wildlife. Existing laws on the illegal killing of elephants and trade of wildlife products such as ivory need to be strengthened.
Elephants frequently move outside the borders of even the largest conservation areas: almost 70 per cent of the Asian elephant’s range is now outside national parks and reserves. Meanwhile, human populations in Asia are increasing at a rate of 2.5-3 per cent a year. Human elephant conflicts have become widespread, and unless innovative measures are adopted to address the concerns of the rural poor, Asian elephants will disappear in the wild throughout most of their range.
Many protected areas are surrounded by a landscape dominated by people, and wildlife authorities must pay attention to the concerns of the human population. Conservationists in Asia must adapt their strategies so as to improve people’s livelihoods because programmes designed for elephants will only succeed if they recognize the concerns and needs of people who compete with the elephants for resources. The emphasis, therefore, must be on accommodating both elephants and human beings.
In order to safeguard the future of elephants in Asia and to promote harmony between humans and elephants, large, well-managed reserves are required. Extended areas where human activities compatible with the existence of elephants need to be established as “managed elephant ranges”. Scientific research should also be strengthened in order to study elephant numbers, distribution and social behaviour. Regulations of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) banning trade in Asian elephant products should be strongly enforced. Strict anti-poaching measures should also be established throughout the elephant’s range, along with the monitoring of vulnerable tuskers. For this the international community should provide support for regional, national and local elephant conservation strategies.
The key to reduce human–elephant conflict in Asia is, first and foremost, to encourage the adoption of sound land-use strategies that would make it more difficult for elephants to stray into human settlements. It will be important to develop mechanisms to predict where human-elephant conflicts are likely to occur, and to enlist the support of governments and local communities to undertake land-use planning in order to minimize the likelihood of such conflicts occurring. Through WWF-supported projects in India, Thailand, Vietnam, Cambodia, China, Indonesia, Bhutan, Nepal, and Malaysia this problem is being assessed and solutions are being sought. People living in elephant areas could be assisted in protecting their homes so that they do not turn hostile towards elephants. All potential elephant corridor areas need to be identified, surveyed, and set aside to ensure the free movement of elephants.
The concept of “managed elephant ranges” offers a compromise whereby both elephants and people could share land resources. Land use practices beneficial to elephants, such as slow rotation timber harvesting, extraction of forest produce, or a low level of shifting cultivation could be practiced in these areas. Ways in which to minimize the human/elephant conflict need to be devised as one of Asia’s highest conservation priorities.

Dr.T.P.Sethumadhavan