Save Wild Life
Saving wildlife
DECCAN HERALD, 28-12-2003
Reflecting on the conservation measures adopted during the past year, SANJAY GUBBI & PRAVEEN BHARGAV point out that through political will and commitment most of the threatened wildlife and their habitats can still be saved
We were only 300 million Indians when the British left their most prized imperial possession. In just over half a century we have more than tripled our population and lost more than 50 lakh hectares of our natural forests. With the country needing to find food, water, shelter, energy, timber and medicine for a new mouth every alternate second, our forests and wild landscapes face fresh and bigger threats. With this burgeoning growth in human population certain species of our wildlife face risk of extinction than ever before.
The Indian Cheetah has been driven to extinction, the brow-antlered deer is facing the risk of extinction, the natural habitat of the tiger has shrunk to less than one percent of its former ranger, the home of Asiatic lion is pushed to one small corner in Gujrat, the habitat range of the Indian one-horned rhinoceros is now restricted to a few pockets in North East India, the rainforest habitat of the lion-tailed macaque is diminishing faster than we expected, the great pied hornbill which shares its habitat with the lion tailed macaque can fly away forever, well protected habitat of the Indian Elephant could be less than two percent of our country's land area.
As natural history writer Tim Radford truly commented in his recent article in the Guardian about wildlife extinction “the first five great extinction of life in the history of the planet were all natural: from volcanic catastrophe, climate change, asteroid impact, or even deadly radiation from an exploding star. But, this one is the unwitting work of humankind”.
Wildlife week and the year that was
Yet another year has quietly passed by. Many of us might not have given a serious thought to wildlife
DECCAN HERALD, 28-12-2003
Reflecting on the conservation measures adopted during the past year, SANJAY GUBBI & PRAVEEN BHARGAV point out that through political will and commitment most of the threatened wildlife and their habitats can still be saved
We were only 300 million Indians when the British left their most prized imperial possession. In just over half a century we have more than tripled our population and lost more than 50 lakh hectares of our natural forests. With the country needing to find food, water, shelter, energy, timber and medicine for a new mouth every alternate second, our forests and wild landscapes face fresh and bigger threats. With this burgeoning growth in human population certain species of our wildlife face risk of extinction than ever before.
The Indian Cheetah has been driven to extinction, the brow-antlered deer is facing the risk of extinction, the natural habitat of the tiger has shrunk to less than one percent of its former ranger, the home of Asiatic lion is pushed to one small corner in Gujrat, the habitat range of the Indian one-horned rhinoceros is now restricted to a few pockets in North East India, the rainforest habitat of the lion-tailed macaque is diminishing faster than we expected, the great pied hornbill which shares its habitat with the lion tailed macaque can fly away forever, well protected habitat of the Indian Elephant could be less than two percent of our country's land area.
As natural history writer Tim Radford truly commented in his recent article in the Guardian about wildlife extinction “the first five great extinction of life in the history of the planet were all natural: from volcanic catastrophe, climate change, asteroid impact, or even deadly radiation from an exploding star. But, this one is the unwitting work of humankind”.
Wildlife week and the year that was
Yet another year has quietly passed by. Many of us might not have given a serious thought to wildlife