To cull or not to cull: Issue of man-animal conflict under the scanner

DNA India , Sunday, July 03, 2016
Correspondent : POOJA PATEL
In the last one year, wild pigs have been termed vermin in parts of Uttarakhand along with nilgai, or blue bull, in Bihar and the monkeys in Himachal Pradesh. In Bihar, for instance, farmers have been facing as much as 70 per cent crop damage due to nilgai. In Himachal Pradesh, rising populations of rhesus macaques pose escalating problems. Here, monkeys are being considered a menace by the people and quite justifiably so. But the monkeys are being fed by the same people, with carelessly-discarded litter and leftovers. In this case, people are also responsible for the problem.

The Indian Wildlife Act, 1972, has a provision that allows declaring a wild animal 'vermin'. Culling such an animal can also be allowed in specific areas and for a specific period. The current government has been clear about using this provision. And as the discussion goes ahead, more regions across the country are demanding respite for their aggrieved farmers.

Unanswered questions

We all need to understand this problem, and focus on it anew. It is clear that there is no one-point solution to resolve this issue. The man-animal conflict — whether it is about crop raiding or leopard-human conflict in cities like Mumbai or Bangalore — has no uniform solution. We need to be realistic and pragmatic about the solutions we suggest. Among the many solutions suggested, fencing off fields, capturing the animals, rehabilitation, sterilisation, etc are among the most commonly heard proposals.

As of now, to sterilisenilgai, we need to physically operate upon them; but do we have the manpower or the capacity to capture 200 nilgai? It is a large herbivore, weighing as much as 300kgs and can gallop at high speed. Sterilisation has a cost involved and its effectiveness is based on a lot of different factors. Then what do we do with those captured animals? Can we look to rehabilitate them? Where? Will people in other areas accept these nilgai to be rehabilitated in their vicinity? Doubtful.

Animals such as wild pigs (a burrowing, digging specialist) show little regard for any fencing. So the proposed solution just does not work. Barbed fences or electric fences have often killed an unwary leopard (an endangered animal) or some other non-target wild fauna.There is no reason for us to think that culling a few hundred nilgai and wild pigs is going to solve the problem of farmers in Bihar, Maharashtra or elsewhere, especially when considering that the animals in question are prolific breeders. Nilgai are known for twin births, while wild pigs can birth 8-10 piglets easily. So to those gun-savvy shooters out there, culling in itself cannot be the only solution either.

Combination cure

The bottom line is that we need to adopt a mixed bag of solutions, which will require scientific communities, government organisations, NGOs and activist groups to work in tandem. We need committed, long-term research studies initiated across the country. It is only based on these studies that effective, long-term and sustainable practices can be developed to tackle this issue.

One point to ponder: while agriculture universities are spending considerable resources on research of insects and arthropod pests, no (if at all minimum) effort is invested on wild fauna as crop predators. What we seriously lack is quality academic input on this subject.?

However, we ?do have some success stories. Look at the work of M Ananda Kumar of the Nature Conservation Foundation (NCF), Mysore. Over the years, his effort has come up with some path-breaking ideas like 'early warning systems' through mobile SMS, cable TV broadcast and red-alert lights to inform people of elephant presence well in advance, and thereby helps mitigate the conflict in the hill town of Valparai,? in Coimbatore district, Tamil Nadu.We also need to look at how other countries around the world view this problem and try to incorporate their learnings. But it is clear we need an array of approaches to look at the issue of crop predation and must never undermine the interest of the farmer. If culling is at all necessary, it needs to be done under the supervision and monitoring of the forest department. Professional shooters must be deployed and this should be done for a very short period of time. The government should ban professional shooters from getting photogrpahed while posing with the dead animals. Such images are just crass and insensitive.

Community effort

Education and awareness are important tools in tackling this issue. Monkeys in Himachal Pradesh, for instance, seem to find food easily from locals as well as tourists. They forage for leftovers around garbage bins and trucks.

The people, as well as the local administration, can be important and long-term solution providers here if they better manage their solid waste.

Even in a metropolis like Mumbai, street dogs feed on garbage, and are in turn preyed upon by leopards. The solution lies with the people and administration. In times of erratic climate change, flood and drought cycles and unsustainable agricultural practices, farmers find themselves between the proverbial rock and the hard place. Using the 'Compensatory Afforestation Fund Management and Planning Authority' (CAMPA) funds — seemingly Rs40,000 crore of it is unused — to compensate farmers in severely-affected cases can go a long way in proving immediate respite.? ?

And however shallow culling may sound as a tactic, it is not that bad an option to act as a face-saver, to buy time, provide immediate respite and hope (however short term it may be) to the farmers, as acknowledgement of the crisis they are facing. This may foster a positive relationship between farmers and wildlife itself, which is crucial.

 
SOURCE : http://www.dnaindia.com/lifestyle/report-to-cull-or-not-to-cull-2230557
 


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