Elephants as giant, rural cash cows
Karthikeyan Manickam
In many parts of Africa elephant are extremely important foreign exchange
earners as they attract tourists. This foreign exchange does not often however
reach the rural farmer whose subsistence crop gets eaten by a herd of elephant.
To conserve these African giants we will need to look far and wide for ideas and
ways of channelling elephant revenues into communities who are adversely
affected by elephant herds.
In Sri-Lanka elephant have been poached by agriculturists to save their
crops. Since 1992 this has resulted in more than 430 elephant deaths. People
numbering more than 240 have also perished in the conflict. Unlike Africa, the
Sri-Lankan elephant crisis is not driven by the ivory trade as the elephant on
this island lack large tusks.
In neighbouring India similar conflicts occur. The Bangalore-based Asian
Elephant Research and Conservation Centre's Founder-Director, Raman Sukumar is
dealing with the conflict between humans and elephants. Sukumar, who recently
won the prestigious international award - Whitley Golden Award (popularly known
as a "Green Oscar") for environment conservation, has experimented
with forms of fencing to keep the elephants away from crops and human
habitation.
Charles Santiapillai of the Department of Zoology, University of Peradeniya,
Sri Lanka, describes the recent advances in using elephant dung to manufature
commodities. These include items such as 'pachyderm papers', which are in turn
used to manufacture cardboard items, notebooks, badges, cards, envelopes, albums
and pretty much any item made from normal paper. The dung is also used to
manufacture lamp shades.
Another wildlife biologist, Wijeyamohan of the University of Jaffna, Sri
Lanka, designed a system to produce biogas from elephant waste for use as a
cooking fuel. This biogas would also replaces fuel-wood minimising the
destruction of forests.
Some Sri Lankan firms also use the residue, formed as a by-product from the
biogas project, as a fertilizer in mushroom culture. It is generally observed
that wild mushrooms often grow on elephant dung.
In the current malaria alert that Africa finds itself burning dried dung can
help keeping the mosquitoes away from us as well.
Useful links:
Addo Elephant Park, South Africa. www.addoelephantpark.com
Conserving Addo's elephants - the past, present and future of the population. More.
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