Elephant Corridors Report

GS Paper III Environment and Ecology

Context:

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

Definition of Corridor: The Elephant Corridors report has classified landscapes and habitats as corridors.
- 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 original meaning of the corridors has been lost and there is a tendency to call every place where elephants move as a corridor.
Contraction Of Area Fit For Large Elephants: 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.
- The document suggests linking these areas to other elephant landscapes, which has never been the intent of the word corridor.
Expansive Corridors: This would significantly escalate human-elephant conflict. Annual human deaths have already increased from 25 to about 500-600.
- The expansion of range is also causing elephant deaths due to electrocution, falling in wells, and entering human-dominated agricultural landscapes.

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.
West Bengal has the most elephant corridors — 26 amounting to 17 per cent of the total corridors, the report said.
East central region contributed to 35 per cent, that is 52 corridors, while North East region was second largest with 32 per cent number meaning 48 corridors in total.

Southern India registered 32, that is 21 per cent of the elephant corridors, while northern India was lowest with 18 corridors or 12 per cent.

Protection Status:

Various initiatives:

Project Elephant: It was launched by the Government of India in the year 1992 as a Centrally Sponsored Scheme To protect elephants, their habitat & corridors.
The Monitoring the Illegal Killing of Elephants (MIKE) programme: It is an international collaboration that measures the levels, trends, and causes of elephant mortality.

News Source: DTE