ITANAGAR, 15 Oct: The Arunachal Pradesh forest department, in collaboration with WWF-India, has launched a project titled ‘The frontier elephants: Conservation action plan for Arunachal Pradesh’ to create an action plan for elephant conservation and human-elephant conflict mitigation in the state.
An inception workshop in this regard was held in the conference hall of the PCCF office here on Tuesday. It brought together all the stakeholders, including government officials, conservation experts and community leaders to discuss and strategise ways to protect the elephant habitats, promote coexistence,and implement a conflict resolution mechanism.
The event featured presentations on the snow leopard survey in Arunachal and also marked the release of the Snow Leopard Survey Report 2021-’22.
It also involved technical sessions and interactive discussions, highlighting the urgent need for coordinated efforts between government bodies, NGOs and local communities.
Addressing the gathering, the Environment & Forests Minister Wangki Lowang reiterated the state’s dedication to wildlife conservation and encouraged coexistence by making the citizens understand the importance of wildlife to human wellbeing. He called for preparing a policy for the compensation offered by the state to those who suffered property or crop damage due to elephants.
Commending the launch of the project, he said, “We have to respect all life, so that the earth remains healthy and livable.”
PCCF (WL&BD) N Tam spoke about “exacerbation of human-elephant adverse interaction due to habitat degradation,” and advocated “multi-sectoral cooperation for the project.”
The three-year project is led by WWF-India. Its objectives are to develop information on elephant demography, connectivity and human-elephant interactions; prepare an action plan for critical elephant landscapes, including elephant corridors of the state; and incorporate action plans into policymaking.
In particular, a conflict mitigation plan will be prepared for priority forest divisions of the state, in view of the adverse human-elephant interactions. Protection of elephant corridors with a legal provision and strengthening of ex gratia was discussed as an important strategy for the safety and the wellbeing of both people and elephants.
