OUR SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT
New Delhi, July 28: The Sunderbans is among 15 tiger reserves with “very good” management practices, but field staff shortages and inadequate training are hampering conservation activities in all of India’s 39 tiger reserves.
An exercise initiated by the Union environment ministry to assess conservation efforts in tiger reserves has dubbed the effectiveness of management as “good” in 12 reserves, satisfactory in eight, and poor in four.
“But staff shortages and ageing field staff across all the reserves threaten conservation efforts,” said Vinod Mathur, dean at the Wildlife Institute of India, Dehra Dun.
“In the absence of fresh recruitment, the ageing staff can’t even hand over their skills to the next generation,” added Mathur, who was involved in the exercise, titled “management effectiveness” evaluation of tiger reserves.
Mathur said the average age of field staff was 52 years, and the shortage across all reserves could touch 30 per cent. Such personnel are tasked with patrolling and routine housekeeping activities in the reserves.
The environment ministry had earlier this year released its new estimate of tigers in India — 1,706, about 20 per cent higher than the 2006 estimate of 1,411, although the latest estimate included the count of 70 tigers in the Sunderbans, unlike the 2006 census.
The “management effectiveness” evaluation assessed the tiger reserves on several conservation-related parameters including habitat management, threat assessment and funding contributions by state governments.
“Bengal provides a substantial level of funding for the Sunderbans — we don’t see that level of funding from any other state,” Mathur said. The funds are used for all conservation-related activities, including patrolling through the reserve’s harsh environment.
Three of the four poorly managed tiger reserves — Indravati and Udanti-Sitanadi in Chhattisgarh and Palamau in Jharkhand — fall in the so-called “Red corridor”, affected by Left-wing extremism. The fourth poorly managed reserve is Satkosia in Orissa.
A detailed analysis of the tiger census, released earlier this year, has shown a 12 per cent decline in the animals’ numbers at “connecting habitats” — corridors of favourable habitat that connect two tiger reserves.
The increase in the overall count since 2006 has been attributed to an increase in tiger density in Uttarakhand, Tamil Nadu, Maharashtra, Karnataka and parts of the Northeast, and the inclusion of the Sunderbans in the estimation.
http://www.telegraphindia.com/1110729/jsp/nation/story_14304797.jsp
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