HABITAT SECURING (HS)

This division seeks to identify, secure and restore crucial wildlife habitats of threatened species that falls outside the Protected Area network.

Its focus areas are;

• To identify, groundtruth, prioritize and list crucial wildlife corridors or areas outside the PA network that are critical for wildlife conservation.

• To influence the Government to provide adequate legal protection to such identified areas.

• To acquire a legal status and ownership of such land by intensive groundtruthing.

• To acquire, cause to acquire or secure such habitat and append to the PA network of the country.

• To monitor the status and usefulness of such securements of habitats.

Habitat securement division also identifies critical wildlife habitats outside Protected Areas and influence the government to notify such areas as Community Reserves granted under the Wildlife Protection Act of 1972.

For various historical reasons, the Wild Lands Programme had focused only on elephant corridors in the initial years of the programme. Soon it was realized that habitat fragmentation had already caused irreparable damages to the eco-system and forced many of the animals to live in isolation. Asian elephants are most affected by these developments and are in constant danger today of wearing away their genetic variation for their long term survival.

Fragmentation of wild habitats also increases the possibility of man-elephant conflicts and is more severe in the agriculture growing areas. Corridors for safe passage of elephants are therefore essential for long-term conservation and protection to these species. The range of the habitat a particular species occupy plays an important role in the survival of that species. In order to ameliorate the effects of habitat fragmentation, the idea of “habitat corridors” was introduced.

Conceptually the program is now set to move into other areas of habitat securement. This could include critical plantation areas for conserving biodiversity by partnering with other stake holders. Coffee plantation, cardamom estates and fragmented forests amidst tea estates in the Western Ghats are unique examples of lands with important biodiversity values.

To fulfill these aims, the programme investigates bio-geographical land-use and species outside protected areas before arriving at a fitting intervention.

If you need more information about this programme, please write to us at - info@wti.org.in