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Uttarakhand: Forest teams to test new process for mitigating conflicts today

HARIDWAR: In a major step aimed at mitigating human-wildlife conflicts (HWC), standard operating procedures (SOPs) for rapid response teams (RRTs) of forest departments across the country will be ground-tested at Motichur range of Rajaji National Park, under an Indo-German partnership.


The focus will be on checking feasibility of SOPs and preparing a checklist of immediate actions required to be taken after each step, during emergencies.



Premier institutes of the country will be asked to incorporate these SOPs in their course modules and for training purposes. SOPs pertaining to elephants and leopards already existed, but now, separate ones have been developed for other conflict species, like monkeys, rhesus macaques and wild boars.

Five RRTs of forest divisions under Rajaji National Park, Dehradun , Haridwar, Pauri and Tehri, will be trained on Wednesday, while the SOPs are pilot-tested under the monitoring of team from GIZ (Deutsche Gesellschaft fur Internationale Zusammenarbeit), as well as scientists, wildlife enthusiasts, senior veterinary officers and forest officers.

The RRTs will have to demonstrate their proficiency in understanding and tackling emergencies, and in challenges they could face while handling such a crisis.

“This is the first time in India that SOPs to mitigate HWCs are being pilot-tested to handle emergencies, to be included in the national action plan (NAP) by the Union ministry of environment, forest and climate change across all states. Some innovative state-of-the-art mitigation instruments will also be implemented at the pilot location,” said Rajiv Bhartari, chief wildlife warden of Uttarakhand forest department.

Interestingly, the field testing at Rajaji will not be limited to ground-testing, but also include development of a HWC mitigation toolkit for major institutes of the country where young IFS officers and scientists are trained.

“We have signed MoUs with national institutes like Indira Gandhi National Forest Academy and Wildlife Institute of India, to give them HWC mitigation toolkits and training modules,” said Neeraj Khera, team leader at GIZ, New Delhi.

Karnataka (Kodagu forest circle) and West Bengal (around Gorumara National Park) are two other conflict-prone states where the SOPs will be ground-tested to cross-check them.

“India has different topography after almost every kilometer. Hence, we wanted to develop modules for different landscapes that address grassroots issues faced by villagers in conflict zones. Karnataka has coffee planters who face challenges from elephants. The landscape is different in West Bengal, where tea planters face threat from different sets of animals, along with issues arising out of proximity to the international border,” said Neeraj Khera.

Asked why Uttarakhand was chosen to pilot the project, Bhartari said, “These states were among a dozen that faced conflicts. We chose them to implement our SOPs after arduous scientific training and interest showcased by forest departments of the respective states.”

GIZ signed a memorandum on HWC in 2017 as part of Indo-German cooperation. After preparing an outline frame for mitigation of conflict, they are now pilot-testing the SOPs at Rajaji.

Meanwhile, Uttarakhand has lost over 350 lives to HWC from 2012 till date, as per forest department data. The attacks were primarily by leopards, elephants and tigers. This year alone, over 30 people have succumbed to wild animal attacks.

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