Bangladesh lags behind in protection of tigers.
Bangladesh lags behind in protection of tigers as compared to other countries. Not only India and Russia, Bhutan and Myanmar are also far more successful in their tiger conservation programmes than Bangladesh.
The Global Tiger Initiative (GTI) has published a report evaluating the progress of nine initiatives taken up in 13 countries of the world. The report comments on this position of Bangladesh.
Evaluating the initiatives for the protection of tigers, GTI has termed the achievements of seven countries as good and satisfactory. Bangladesh is not in that category. India is the most successful in this regard, followed by Thailand. Russia, Nepal, Bhutan and Indonesia have also displayed success in meeting several of the nine targets of GTI.
Along with Bangladesh, the countries which have failed to meet GTI targets for tiger conservation are Nepal, Cambodia, China and Vietnam.
Bangladesh has failed to meet with success in any of the nine targets. Every initiative of Bangladesh in this regard has been termed as “under process”.
The GTI conference began in Dhaka on Monday, to be concluded today with a Dhaka Declaration. While Bangladesh is the host of the conference, it could not even given an update on the number of tigers in its own country.
GTI Operations Officer Andrew Zakharenka tells Prothom Alo, full points for fulfilling the nine targets is 2 and in this regard, 1.24 indicates the minimum points for satisfactory performance. Bangladesh achieved 1 point as it could not complete any of the initiatives. This falls below the average mark.
The progress report presented by Bangladesh depicts its successes in the increase of the Forest department funds by 95 percent, the efficiency of newly appointed personnel and procurement of new patrol boats. However, the GTI report stated that the recovery of three tigers smuggled out by poachers and the treatment of two wounded tigers which were then sent back to the Sundarbans, were examples of success.
Dr. Tapan Kumar Dey, Conservator of Forests, Wildlife Department, says that the measures taken by the Forest Department for the conservation of tigers will soon see success. He said that Bangladesh’s position will be good by the coming year.
Bangladesh behind target: Tigers have been identified as a critically endangered species. GTI has recommended a number of targets for the conservation of this animal These include increasing the required infrastructure, ensuring safety of its habitat, involving the local people in tiger conservation, ensuring afforestation of the tiger’s habitat, allocation of adequate funds for tiger conservation, involving businesspersons and industrial institutions in the protection of the tiger, creating awareness and increasing supervision of tiger conservation.
Bangladesh has said it would employ 957 persons over the past two years in the Forest department for tiger conservation purposes. Till last July, 807 persons were appointed. The target for temporary employees was 231, but only 131 were appointment. Despite the commitment, no risk allowance and communication allowance is paid to the forest staff. The Forest Department is yet to procure the two sea trawlers, a launch to oversee tiger safety and two launches for the Forest Department officials.
The Bangladesh Forest Department was also supposed to procure 30 shotguns for the forest guards to protect the tigers and five tranquiliser guns, but have not done so. The GTI report also pointed out that sufficient fuel was not provided for the boats used for overseeing the tiger protection work.
Confusion over number of tigers: The tiger survey carried out by the Forest Department with the assistance of UNDP in 2004, by monitoring paw tiger marks, put the number of tigers in Bangladesh at 440. In 2006, a survey carried out by photographs taken by Professor Dr. Monirul H Khan of Jahangirnagar University’s Department of Zoology, at the initiative of the Zoological Society of London, showed the number to be 200.
From last June another camera survey, financed by the World Bank and assisted by the Forest Department of India, has been undertaken. It is estimated that there won’t be more than 200 tigers in Bangladesh.
Tiger specialist Prof. Monirul H Khan of Jahangirnagar University tells Prothom Alo Bangladesh is leading the global initiative to conserve tigers by organising the tiger conference. This will reveal the true picture of Bangladesh’s initiatives for the protection of tigers. This will help Bangladesh is conserving the tigers of the Sunderbans.
Source: Prothom Alo
