|
BIG CAT UNDER THREAT: A tiger in Ranthambore National Park, in India's north-western Rajasthan state. Conservationists say poaching has decimated the tiger population but they add that urbanisation and loss of forest cover are also to blame. -- PHOTO: AFP
|
NEW DELHI - INDIA may have just 1,300 to 1,500 tigers left - less than half of the number believed to exist five years ago - conservationists say.
The final results of a state-by-state census are expected in December but at a conservation meeting during the week, a noted Indian tiger expert put the number of the cats left in the country at 1,500 or fewer.
'The indications are that the present tiger population in India is between 1,300 and 1,500,' said conservationist Valmik Thapar in New Delhi on Friday.
Mr Thapar said both wildlife experts and government officials were in agreement on the figure, a sharp drop from the 3,700 tigers believed to live in India in 2002.
An Indian government official at the meeting would only call the number an 'indication'.
'It's a preliminary indication,' Mr Ravindra B. Lal, a senior wildlife official, said on Saturday.
'It cannot be called an official figure. The population estimation is still going on.'
Other wildlife experts, however, said the final figure from the new tally, which uses technology such as camera traps rather than relying on pug marks (paw prints) as past surveys did, was likely to be close to the one given by Mr Thapar.
'I'd give you the same figure,' Mr Ravi Singh, head of WWF India, said. 'These are based on the government's estimates. You can attach a fair value to them. They are reasonably accurate.'
Experts have warned that because of the changes in methodology, it is not possible to make a direct comparison between the old and new estimates. But they said it was still possible to note a sharp decline in the tiger population.
'What is important to understand is that the tiger is decreasing in particular areas,' said Mr Samir Sinha, head of the India branch of wildlife trade monitoring group Traffic.
A partial survey released in May after more than half of India's 28 sanctuaries had been studied by the Wildlife Institute of India, which is conducting the census, estimated there were only about 500 tigers in those areas.
The sanctuary tiger population was about 1,500 in 2002, according to official figures. The rest were in the wild.
Poaching has decimated the population of the big cat but urbanisation and loss of forest cover are also to blame.
Tiger parts are used in traditional Chinese medicines, although international trade has been banned since 1993.
Conservationists have long complained that many Indian forestry posts lie vacant, while the staff that do exist have little in the way of funds, making them no match for poachers.
AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE
|
