Assessment of recent elephant poaching in Simlipal Tiger Reserve

-  News Leave a Comment

Simlipal Tiger Reserve (STR) is part of one of the largest contiguous tiger and elephant habitats in the world. With a Biosphere Area of over 5,000 sq km, it is one of the most promising landscapes for tigers and their prey species.

After a number of elephant deaths were reported in April and May 2010, the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) constituted an independent assessment team on 3rd June 2010. The two-team members (Biswajit Mohanty and Belinda Wright) proceeded immediately … Read More

Whither Forest Departments?

-  Articles, -  The Featured Posts Leave a Comment

Armed with all the right buzzwords such as ‘participatory biodiversity conservation’; ‘use it or lose it’; ‘micro planning’; ‘stakeholder support’… which are liberally bandied about in project proposals to woo funding agencies, a coterie of ill-informed groups with many state forest departments in the middle, are now threatening the ecological foundations of wild India.

My first amateur attempts at conserving wildlife and forests, more than two decades ago, led me to interact with the forest department, which is entrusted with … Read More