Elephant corridor report plagued with inconsistencies, could escalate conflict with humans, says expert

Elephant corridor report plagued with inconsistencies, could escalate conflict with humans, says expert

Subject: Environment

Section: Protected Areas

Context:

• An expert has flagged multiple inconsistencies in the recently published report on elephant corridors of India by the central government.

Details:

• The central government released a report titled Elephant Corridors of India, 2023, which mentioned an increase of 62 ‘corridors’ in the country since 2010, bringing the total to 150 — an increase of 40 per cent.
• Raman Sukumar, elephant expert and professor at the Indian Institute of Science (IISc), brought up inconsistencies in the definition of corridors in the report during a standing committee meeting of the National Board for Wildlife.
• The report has classified landscapes and habitats as corridors.
• A corridor in Jharkhand was documented as being about 46 km long but 30 metres wide. This means that if a herd of elephants has to walk in this corridor, they should move in a single file. This is a complete anomaly. Similarly, there are anomalies in the case of Odisha where the corridor is 75 km long.
• The areas in West Bengal close to Odisha and Jharkhand, like Mayurjhirna, have only small patches of forest cover that are fit for elephants. The rest of the areas where elephants move in south Bengal are human-dominated agricultural fields. The elephants go to Bankura, East Midnapur, West Midnapur and even Bangladesh.

What is an elephant corridor?

• A corridor is supposed to be a small patch of land that provides connectivity for elephant movement across habitats, largely within a landscape of the elephant reserve.
• Landscapes, being an overarching geographical entity, are partly fragmented due to agricultural contingencies. The corridors then serve as crucial links between habitats spread across these landscapes.
• The Project Elephant in 2005-06 issued directives to states concerned over corridors for elephants. The ones in forest areas shall be notified under the rules mentioned under the Wild Life (Protection) Act, 1972.
• While for the areas with revenue lands, private lands, must be notified under the Environment (Protection) Act, 1986 as eco-sensitive, for which the red-category industries may be prohibited.

Impact of Elephant Corridor Expansion:

• Increase in human-elephant conflict
• Elephant deaths due to electrocution,
• Falling into wells and
• Entering human-dominated agricultural landscapes

Source of this article: Down To Earth