Fence villages; keep forests open: MP calls for policy shift in Sri Lanka’s human-elephant conflict (Sri Lanka)
Fence villages; keep forests open: MP calls for policy shift in Sri Lanka’s
human-elephant conflict (Sri Lanka)
Imesh Ranasinghe, Economy Next
July 20, 2021
See link
https://economynext.com/fence-villages-keep-forests-open-mp-calls-for-policy-shift-in-sri-lankas-human-elephant-conflict-84164/
for photo.
Sri Lanka must formulate new policy to address what has now become the
worst human-elephant conflict in the world, Committee on Public Accounts
(COPA) Chairman Prof Tissa Vitharana said.
Presenting the first COPA report in parliament Tuesday (20) morning,
Vitharana said that policies adopted by authorities to date to address the
conflict has only resulted in increased human and elephant deaths.
The government MP said implementing a proposal by elephant expert and head
of the Centre for Conservation and Research (CCR) Dr Prithiviraj Fernando
would be “far more sensible”.
Ferando had proposed erecting electric fences around vulnerable villages
and cultivation sites while leaving the rest of the forest open. According
to Vitharana, Fernando had tested his method for seven years in Galgamuwa,
in the Kurunegala district.
“I went there and saw what had happened. I spoke to the villagers. They
said there is no conflict there anymore but instead a friendship has
developed between the humans and elephants,” the MP said.
Sri Lanka has the highest casualty rate in the human-elephant conflict in
the world, according to former Wildlife Department Director General Dr
Sumith Pilapitiya.
2019-2020 saw 407 elephants killed as against the previous annual average
of 272. The number of people killed also increased from an average of 85
humans to 122 per year.
“During discussions with the ministries concerned, it became clear that
over the past nine to 10 years, the costs [incurred in preventing conflict
between elephants and humans] have gone up. But at the same time, the
number of human and elephant deaths has also increased,” said Vitharana.
“Obviously the policy was wrong because the policy was to herd the
elephants into a restricted forest area,” the government MP said.
COPA deliberations have also revealed that only female elephants and baby
elephants were getting into villages, said Vitahrana, adding that the
animals were starving and dying in the forests when food was scarce.
“The real troublemakers, the big elephants, were roaming around continuing
to create trouble,” he said.
Sri Lanka spent a total of Rs 490 million on construction electric fences
in 2019 and 2020.
The total length of the electric fence constructed in 2019 and 2020 is
4,756 km, according to an audit ordered by COPA and carried out by Dr
Fernando and the CCR.
Although the National Action Plan for the Mitigation of Human-Elephant
Conflict was prepared by a multi-stakeholder committee chaired by Dr
Fernando and was handed over to the government in December 2020, the
government has so far failed to implement it.