India’s Tiger population up by 33% : Main challenge to address man-animal conflict

On the occasion of International Tiger Day on July 29, Prime Minister Narendra Modi released the results of the fourth cycle of All India Tiger Estimation – 2018. Also known as Global Tiger Day, began its journey in 2010 at the Saint Petersburg Tiger Summit. It aims to create awareness to support the Tiger conservation issues and protect the natural habitat of Tigers.

The count of tigers in India, has risen to 2967, in 2018 from 2226 in 2014 according to this survey. During the Saint Petersburg summit, the Tiger range countries had pledge to double the tiger count by 2022.

Interesting facts:

1. Tiger number in India has increased from 1,411 in 2006 to 2967 in 2018
2. India achieved its commitment to the St.Petersburg Declaration, much in advance to the
   2022 deadline.
3. Madhya Pradesh saw the highest number of tigers at 526, closely followed by Karnataka at 524 with Uttarakhand at number 3 with 442 tigers.
4. Chhatisgarh and Mizoram saw a decline in their tiger numbers while tigers numbers in Odisha
   remained constant.
5. There are 50 Tiger reserves in India as on June 2018
6. Among 13 countries, India topped the list in tiger population in the wild
7. According to the National Tiger Conservation Authority, with the available area of tiger reserves India can have a maximum of 3,000 tigers
8. During the 4th cycle, the data was collected using an Android based application- M-STrIPES ( Monitoring system for Tigers’ Intensive Protection and Ecological Status) and analysed on the applications’ desktop module. The, application greatly eased out analysis of a large quantum of data that was collected over nearly 15 months involving survey of 381,400 sq.km. of forested habitats, 522,996 km of walk by State Forest officials, laying of 317,958 habitat plots,
   totalling a human investment of 5,93,882 man days. Besides cameras were placed in 26760 locations which gave a total of 35 million images of wildlife including 76523 images of tigers. Segregation of these images was possible in a short time because of use of artificial intelligence software.
9. The Prime Minister also released trailer of the documentary titled “Counting Tigers” to be aired worldwide on August 7.
10. With the Tiger population reaching a threshold, the main challenge is to protect the reserves and also address the increasing man-animal conflict.
11. Thanks to all the forest officials who have worked relentlessly to protect the Tiger population

Source: NTCA, First Post, pic courtesy: Tripadvisor

Message us on WhatsApp to subscribe for daily updates