© Environment News Service (ENS) 2001
October 1, 2001

BEIJING, China, October 1, 2001 (ENS) - The Asian elephant conservation project, initiated by the International Fund for Animal Welfare in Simao, China's Yunnan Province, is one step closer to easing human wildlife conflicts with support from government agencies in both the United States and China. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service recently granted US$48,000 to the project.

The grant coincides with a new five year ban on hunting elephants, issued by the Simao Prefecture government.

About 35,000 to 50,000 Asian elephants survive in 13 countries. The creature originated 55 million years ago and herds once roamed the vast area between modern Iraq and Syria to the Yellow River in China.

Today, Asian elephants are found from India to Vietnam, with a tiny population in the extreme southwest of China's Yunnan Province.

Asian elephants enjoy first class protection under the Wildlife Protection Law of China. The Simao area, located southwest of Yunnan province, has historically been an Asian elephant habitat.

Since 1992, though, due to the depletion of natural habitat caused by human activities, wild elephants have frequented villages in Simao where they have destroyed crops, houses and injured people. The escalating conflict threatened the lives of between five to 20 of the only 250 elephants in the country.

To address the human elephant conflict in the Simao area, in July 2000 the International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW) initiated the Asian Elephant Project, the first wildlife protection project implemented by an international non-governmental organization n the local area. Instead of the conventional compensation mechanism, which passively addresses the demand of local villagers, IFAW funded the local government to develop community economic programs in order to ease the pressure on farmers caused by elephant activities.

By providing micro-credit loan assistance to the area's rural communities, the project encourages local farmers to actively seek alternative farming and to reduce agricultural activities in the forest.

During a recent project evaluation, IFAW and its partner in the project implementation, the Simao Forestry Bureau, found the rate of return plus interest for the micro-credit loans has been 100 percent. Many families have successfully shifted to alternative farming to ease the land pressure in the forest.

The farmers' attitudes towards wildlife habitat conservation have also changed. Where some farmers once seemed to kill elephants out of hatred, most are now leaning towards peaceful coexistence with elephants.

"We are very grateful to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service for joining us in this worthy project," said Grace Gabriel, IFAW China country director. "We also congratulate the decision by the Simao government to extend the hunting ban. This will allow the wildlife in the area to recover as our project expands to build elephant migration corridors that connect isolated eco-regions."

The education component of the project, which is being conducted in four villages, includes farming techniques, human safety awareness, wildlife protection and habitat conservation. Scientific research in the area has identified elephant food patterns, and resulted in the construction of salt licks in the forest to attract elephants away from the crops.

IFAW's total commitment to the three year project will be about US$175,000 (RMB1.5 million). Error: Unable to read footer file.