Conservation Results

Members of village anti-depredation squad that patrols at night to keep elephants away from crops, at Sessa tea estate.
© WWF-Canon / Rommell Shunmugam

A herd leaves the Tarajulie Tea Estate, where they had taken up residence for several days, after being driven out by a WWF-sponsored elephant drive - part of an effort to reduce human-elephant conflict in a non-lethal manner.
© WWF-Canon / Jan Vertefeuille

Our work has already achieved the following:

• We have identified the worst conflicts spots and conducted hundreds of "elephant drives" there, employing trained domesticated elephants and handlers to drive wild elephants out of human habitation and back to forested areas. Since 2004, when WWF began this project, elephants have changed their patterns of crop-raiding and are avoiding the areas we are protecting during subsequent seasons.
  
  
• We have organized 50 village-based squads to serve as an early warning system to scare elephants away from village crops, arming them with non-lethal supplies like spotlights and firecrackers.
  
  
• We have launched a community-outreach program to villagers who have illegally settled in forest reserves that elephants depend on. We are also working with the government to reforest key habitat to make room for elephants once again.
  
  
• The number of human deaths and elephant deaths are on the decline - for the first time since the 1990s - since WWF launched its pilot project to reduce human-elephant conflict in 2004.
  
  
• A cost-benefit analysis reveals that property and crop damage are down dramatically as a result of WWF’s conflict mitigation work.

Future Goals

Our goals for the next 5 years include:

• Conducting further elephant population surveys.
• Capacity building and training for government personnel.
• Capacity building and empowerment of local communities for participation in conservation.
• Restoring critical corridors through negotiations with forest settlers (encroachers) in order to reclaim lost forests.
• Engaging local communities in critical corridors through livelihoods program.
• Establishing a transboundary conservation landscape between India and Bhutan.
• Securing elephant and tiger habitats by connecting existing protected areas.