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A complete ban on mining activities in areas of national parks, tiger reserves and wildflife sancturies could be on the anvil if the government agrees to the recommendations of a high-level environment ministry panel.
The panel, chaired by then environment ministry secretary T Chatterjee, has recommended that thick forests in such areas should be classified as ”inviolate”.
”Mining blocks shall be considered inviolate if majority of grids falling within a block have been labelled as inviolate,” according to the report of the committee to Formulate Objective Parameters for Identification of Inviolate Forest Areas.
The forest grids have to be determined based on their biological richness, thickness, landscape integrity and hydrological and wildlife values, said the report placed in public domain by the ministry on Friday.
The panel submitted the report in July last, the ministry chose to make it public at a time when there is lot of discussion in the country on the issue of diversion of forest areas for mining and infrastructure projects.
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Private commercial resorts in the vicinity of wildlife sanctuaries will soon have to shut up shop. A decision to this effect was taken at a meeting of the Forest department officials on Monday.It was also decided to shut down all guesthouses of the department inside the forest areas having tiger and elephant populations and shift
them outside the forest zone.In the backdrop of the Centre’s assurance to the Supreme Court that there would be no permanent tourist facilities in core areas of reserve forests, minister CP Yogeshwara said 25-30 private lodges in the buffer zone will face action. Some are run by kith and kin of influential persons. “The move has been initiated as per the SC order to preserve the buffer zone of tiger reserves and elephant corridors in Bandipur and Nagarahole,” the forest minister told reporters on Monday.
The SC order was based on a study which said the tiger’s natural habitat in Bandipur and Nagarahole is being disturbed. The order has compelled the state government to clear the core forest area and buffer zone of private lodges.
CHENNAI, October 20, 2012
By combining Srivilliputhur, Megamalai and Varushanadu
The National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) has suggested the formation of a fifth tiger reserve in the State by combining the Grizzled Giant Squirrel Sanctuary in Srivilliputhur, the Megamalai Wildlife Sanctuary and Varushanadu Valley in Theni district.
The contiguity of these sanctuaries, along with Kerala’s Periyar Tiger Reserve that adjoins the stretch, and the increased tiger sighting in these protected areas have prompted the NTCA to suggest the fifth tiger reserve in the State. It has already granted in-principle approval to the Sathyamangalam Wildlife Sanctuary adjoining the Mudumalai Tiger Reserve. It is only a formality before Sathyamangalam becomes the fourth tiger reserve in the State, officials say.
“Value Corridors”
In its comprehensive guidelines for tiger conservation sent to Chief Wildlife Wardens and Directors of Tiger Reserves, the NTCA has pointed out that habitat fragmentation was adversely affecting wildlife due to decreased opportunity available for their movement from different habitats. This, in turn, prevented gene flow among them in the landscape.
The habitats also act as smaller ‘source’ by facilitating breeding and movement of native wildlife populations to colonise adjoining habitats. Natural resources such as rivers or mountain ranges may act as boundaries for wildlife population. However, disturbance of corridors on account of human interventions such as highways, canals, industries, roads, railway tracks or transmission lines would be harmful to wildlife, the NTCA had cautioned.
The NTCA has sought involvement of different sectors necessary to reduce man-tiger conflicts in the reserves. Forestry, agriculture, welfare activities through district collectors, tourism, fisheries, tea/coffee estates, road and rail transport, industry, mining, thermal power plants, irrigation projects, temple tourism and communication projects operating in a reserve will be instrumental in effectively addressing man-tiger conflicts besides helpful in mainstreaming tiger and wildlife concerns, the NTCA has said.
Welcoming the NTCA’s suggestion to form the fifth tiger reserve in the State, T.S. Subramanian, Secretary, Wildlife Association of Rajapalayam, said it would help in improving the condition of the landscape in the selected area. Secondly, with the formation of a tiger reserve, a buffer zone would be created where eco-development initiatives could be taken up with the help of locals.
Importantly, the creation of tiger reserve here could eventually lead to the protection of the source of Vaigai river that originates in these mountain ranges, say environmental activists.
Acquisition of plantations, mostly in distress due to non-availability of labour, in these ranges also could bolster conservation and protect the river’s sources, activists emphasise.
These areas, though contiguous, are at present managed by two different officers in the rank of District Forest Officers. Clubbing these areas and bringing them under a single officer would help in better management of the entire reserve, add the activists.
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The Supreme Court (SC)on Thursday postponed making a decision on the status of its interim ban on tourism in the core areas of tiger reserves, and instead asked stakeholders to submit within
In its previous hearing on 29 August, the apex court directed the government to re-draft guidelines for eco-tourism in tiger reserve. The government submitted its new guidelines to the court on 26 September. The guidelines, some experts said, re-drafted under pressure from lobbyists for the tiger tourism industry, which is worth at least 1000 crore annually.
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Officials, wildlife enthusiasts and conservationists are waiting with bated breath for Thursday’s Supreme Court verdict on tourism in the core of areas of wildlife sanctuaries. With
The Centre on Wednesday filed an affidavit in the Supreme Court requesting that the ban on tourism in core areas of tiger reserves be lifted. In the affidavit, the Centre has outlined the revised guidelines to protect the tiger population and requested the court to permit tourism activities in 20% of the core tiger habitat. The guidelines also seek phasing out of permanent tourist facilities located inside the core areas of the reserve in a specified time frame.
Facing pressure from the states, the Centre had moved the Supreme Court seeking permission to revise the guidelines and the court gave permission. The Supreme Court will take up the issue on September 27.
The National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) on Wednesday submitted new guidelines to the SC stating that at present, tourists were permitted to visit only 20% of the core areas of tiger reserves and it was well within the ecologically permissible levels. Taking into account the court’s concern for tiger conservation, the NTCA, functioning under the ministry of environment and forests, said that conservation efforts must have public participation and regulated tourism was an effective and invaluable tool to harness community support for this purpose.
The NTCA submitted the new guidelines to the court. which said, “With the importance of tourism in tiger conservation in mind, it is recommended that a maximum of 20% of the core/critical tiger habitat usage (not exceeding the present usage) for regulated, low-impact tourist visitation may be permitted.”
The new guidelines said, “Any core area in a tiger reserve from which relocation has been carried out will not be used for tourism infrastructure.” This means that the guidelines permit continuance of existing lodging facilities put up by the government and private people in core areas but no future construction would be allowed.
The guidelines also kept in mind the rehabilitation of forest dwellers.”Tourism infrastructure must conform to environment-friendly, low-impact aesthetic architecture, including solar energy, waste recycling, rainwater harvesting, natural cross-ventilation, proper sewage disposal and merging with surroundings. All tourist facilities in core areas must conform to these specifications,” it added. It also recommended phasing out of permanent tourist facilities in core/critical areas.
Taking into account the court’s concern for tiger conservation, the NTCA said that conservation efforts must have public participation and regulated tourism was an effective and invaluable tool to harness community support for this purpose.
Times View
Some environmentalists might be outraged by the suggestion that tourism should be allowed in the core areas of tiger reserves, but we believe it is the sensible thing to do with safeguards. Creating a situation in which local populations and tourists have no stake in the core areas does not help protect tigers. On the contrary, it leaves poachers and those willing to collude with them as the dominant stakeholders in these areas if not the only ones. That would be a recipe for disaster. It is much better to allow tourist activity within well-defined and strictly monitored restrictions.
First Published: Mon, Sep 24 2012. 10 18 PM IST
LUCKNOW: Taking a serious note of the death of tigers in Dudhwa Tiger Reserve in Lakhimpur district, the Lucknow bench of Allahabad HC has directed strict implementation of its order of considering constitution of a special tiger protection force.
The bench of acting Chief Justice Amitav Lala and Justice Anil Kumar passed the order on a Public Interest Litigation last week.
The petitioner Satish Kumar Mishra has sought direction for stern action against poachers and forest mafias in connection with death of three tigers within four days at Dudhwa in June last.
The petitioner sought direction to constitute a special tiger protection force for the security of the big cats.
On June one, the court sought information from the Centre and the state government as well as director of Tiger Protection authority that why constitution of the force should not be considered.
The court fixed next date of hearing after three weeks along with a similar petition and in between directed to seek direction from the respondents in the wake of its June one order.
The court also took cognisance of the fact that though order was issued on June one, in between one more tiger had died therefore order to consider constitution of the special force should be implemented strictly and at the earliest otherwise action would be taken against authorities concerned
Posted on 15 September 2012
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The tiger tourism debate excludes the traditionally excluded but the new MoEF panel must protect conservation’s biggest stakeholders
By Jay Mazoomdaar
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| Policy fodder The first tiger airlifted to Sariska was poisoned to death near Kankwari village which was being shifted outside the reserve
Photos: Jay Mazoomdaar |
What is the cost of saving the tiger? What is the benefit? Who bears the cost? And who is the beneficiary?
While a fresh panel of experts appointed this week by the Ministry of Environment and Forests has just 10 days to redraft the eco-tourism guidelines to safeguard the tiger so that the Supreme Court may lift the interim ban on tourists by the time reserves become accessible after the monsoon, these questions demand answers.
After its last amendment in 2006, the Wildlife Protection Act required the government to declare inviolate core and dual-use buffer areas in each tiger reserve. Most reserves anyway had a demarcated core and buffer. But, to secure maximum possible land from the Forest Rights Act that would soon empower forest villagers, the green ministry notified the existing core and buffer in most reserves as Critical Tiger Habitat (CTH), the new core.
Since most of India’s reserves are pocket forests, it naturally became difficult to find additional areas to be declared as new buffers. At the same time, forest villages were being shifted out of CTHs to make the new cores inviolate while tourism in such areas remained unaffected. Under these circumstances, petitioners moved court, seeking speedy notification of buffers and a ban on tourism in inviolate CTHs.
This led to the interim ban on tourism. A few buffer areas were notified hurriedly, some far away from cores with little or no conservation value. The Centre’s first set of tourism guidelines failed to address the danger of mushrooming resorts around core areas that block wildlife movement, plunder natural resources, cause pollution and further alienate the local poor. Instead, the focus remained on the much less damaging and easily manageable jeep and elephant safaris inside core forests.
The conservationists who strongly backed the green ministry’s sweeping notifications marking expansive CTHs to keep local communities out are now lambasting the demarcations as arbitrary. It is a comic admission of double-standards triggered by their high stake in tourism which now faces the threat of a shutdown in core areas.
The wildlife tourism lobby is now claiming credit for the high number of tigers in tourism zones. The claim belies the fact that tourism originally gravitated to high tiger presence areas and, therefore, it is natural that most tourism zones today have a relative abundance of tigers. If tourism alone could save tigers, the wipeout in Sariska and Panna would have never happened.
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Some hoteliers are even asserting that their choice of business is an unrewarding social duty, a sacrifice made for conservation. While some of them are bona fide conservationists, they underplay the fact that their green initiatives ultimately serve as business USPs for discerning clients who are often willing to shell out serious money.
Not surprisingly this debate excludes the traditionally excluded. Our tiger reserves never belonged to the tiger alone. Otherwise, the government would not have to relocate villages. There is hardly any “wild” place as we like to imagine it on earth. Even the so-called impregnable forests of central India were the home of the Gond tribals. In every forest, wildlife survived, flourished or declined as a factor of human socio-economic equations.
A number of present tiger forests were once hunting reserves. Many more were nurtured by communities. Even the wildest of places were not unfamiliar to the human footprint before researchers decided to venture there. The sustainability of our shrinking wilderness today is challenged by the growing population and modern aspirations of the traditional forest dwellers. But it is undermined equally, if not more, by our destructive need for growth.
Inviolate zones help tiger conservation. The human cost of it is to sacrifice the resources in such areas. This means the economy cannot monetise the land, the timber or the minerals underground. For the local communities at the very margin of that economy, this leads to displacement, loss of livelihood and culture. While the damage to the national exchequer is shared by a billion-plus Indians, the locals, in their suffering, are alone. The state may still harness the resources every now and then in national interest but the alienation of the locals remains non-negotiable.
The ecological — and therefore economic in the long term — benefits of conservation, again, are shared by every Indian. The direct financial benefits, however, are few unless locals are allowed to sustainably harvest forest produce. In such a scenario, tourism is the most effective legitimate means of monetising the tiger. But there is no quantification yet of how much money tiger tourism generates and what percentage of it goes to local communities. The industry has neither volunteered nor encouraged such studies.
Lack of education, skill or hygiene is no excuse for denying the people who pay the maximum price for conservation the bulk of the profit tourism generates. It is their land where the tiger flourishes and keeps the industry in business. Since doles never help in the long run, such communities have to be brought to the centre of eco-tourism through training in soft skills and co-operative financing.
The tourism guidelines cannot safeguard the tiger without taking care of the interests of conservation-affected communities. Tourists are minor stakeholders here. They, to quote a post-ban social media campaign, do not kill tigers. But can they save the big cat if forest villagers turn hostile? Fortunately, they won’t have to if tourism incentivises communities to look after the tiger.
Jay Mazoomdaar is an Independent Journalist.
jaymazoomdaar@gmail.com
