A stakeholder meeting on mitigation of man-animal conflict was organised by Intanki National Park in collaboration with Peren Forest Division at Jalukie, Peren on May 3.
Peren, May 3 (MExN): A stakeholder meeting on mitigation of man-animal conflict was organised by Intanki National Park in collaboration with Peren Forest Division at Jalukie, Peren on May 3. It was held with participations from man-animal conflict afflicted villages along with civil society organizations and police department, Prabhat Kumar, IFS, DFO, Peren stated in a press release.
Addressing the meeting, Hemant Kamdi Baskar, IFS Conservator of Forests (Hq) spoke on “the elephants and their rights.” He appealed to the stakeholders to do the same rather than having human centric approach to the problems for the reason that elephants being very important stakeholders are not represented.
Baskar projected the analogy of human addiction of processed unhealthy food and that of forage optimization of the elephants by raiding crops to connect the people with similar psychological behavior patterns between humans and animals. He also reminded people about the sacrifices made by Openthung Jami, Forester who succumbed to health issues and died while assisting people of Wokha in resolving human-elephant conflict.
Manish Bharti, IPS, SP Peren in his address highlighted that the issue of man-animal conflict arises as a result of encroachment of the animals’ habitat by human and as such to give space and protect them is our greatest responsibility.
He expressed that human evolved as much superior species than any other and with this great power comes great responsibility taking care of other species like elephants. He also expressed his concerns about never ending debate between development vs conservation and urged upon the gathering to give due importance to conservation while acknowledging the importance of conservation.
NZPO President Kevipelie gave a chronological sequence of how Intanki Reserved Forests evolved into a National Park. He mentioned on how the local people living around the National Park played crucial role in the protection and conservation of forests and wildlife.
T Aochuba, IFS, Field Director, Intanki National Park in his speech expressed the desire to work hand in hand with the stakeholders and civil society to mitigate the problems of man-animal conflict in the state. An elaborate PowerPoint presentation was made on how to mitigate the conflicting situations by adopting ways and means including the techniques that are adopted in different part of India. He also highlighted the policies and steps taken by the Government to mitigate the conflict by means compensation to crop damages, injury to human and/or death due to such undesirable situation.
There were serious discussions and experience sharing from the participants on the issue and the programme concluded with a vote of thanks from Peter Jesuha Konyak.
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