BENGALURU: In a recent study titled- Community mitigation decisions in elephant conflict zones of Southern India depend on environmental and socio-economic drivers, by Centre for Wildlife Studies (CWS) and Manipal Academy of Higher Education, researchers said factors like rainfall, elevation, land size and other factors influenced household decisions to adopt mitigation measures for preventing human-elephant conflict.
Scientists surveyed 507 households across Karnataka and Kerala and found that commonly used barriers caused the unintended harm to elephants.
They noted that trenches were the leading cause of elephant injuries in Karnataka (12.8% of recorded cases), while solar fences in Karnataka (25.5%) and electric fences in Kerala (38.3%) accounted for most of the 47 recorded elephant deaths. They also noted that households in drier areas with moderate landholdings were 68% more likely to adopt mitigation measures, while those in wetter regions with larger, water-adjacent plots had only a 7% likelihood.
Trenches, solar fences, and electric fences were the main causes of elephant injuries (8) and deaths (47), the report stated. The team studied 13 variables that influenced mitigation decisions. Rainfall was the single most important predictor (28%), followed by elevation (16.8%), acres owned (15.7%) and crop type (rubber, coconut, arecanut) amongst others.
Land cover type, number of conflict events, and respondent age played smaller roles. In the study, scientists used a Classification and Regression Tree (CART) model to investigate what drives households to adopt conflict mitigation measures.
During assessment, researchers found that 65.8% respondents expressed sadness or empathy upon seeing injured or dead elephants, citing cultural and religious reverence. 80.1% respondents urged authorities, including the forest department, panchayats and state governments, to intervene. They recommended rail fencing, solar fencing, trenches, electric fencing, and night patrolling.
“The extremely fragile nature of human-elephant interactions and the incidents leading to preventable injuries and deaths of both people and elephants, necessitate that we urgently develop non-lethal solutions and preventive measures, such as the use of multiple technological solutions for effective real-time elephant detections and scaling of early warning systems. Restoring degraded lands, promoting agroforestry and improving habitat connectivity can help reduce direct conflict,” said Krithi K Karanth, from CWS.