RESOLVING HUMAN-ELEPHANT CONFLICT IN SRI LANKA
New and pragmatic approaches need to be adopted to mitigate the prevailing conflict between humans and elephants in Sri Lanka in which both become losers.
The most complex and intractable challenge that currently faces the Department of Wildlife Conservation (DWLC) in Sri Lanka is, undoubtedly, the Human-Elephant Conflict (HEC), frequently reported in the local media. The deprivation of the natural habitats of wild elephants resulting from deforestation due to agricultural and irrigational projects has forced them to encroach upon farmlands of villagers in quest of food, devastating crops and damaging the houses of farmers. Although elephants have been held in some esteem over the years in the Sri Lankan culture, they, regrettably, are now being regarded by villagers as unwanted neighbours and as an agricultural pest. Due to the large size of these animals and their intemperate appetite, the elephants can destroy a whole plantation overnight.
DWLC reports confirmed that at least 1369 elephants have been killed in the last decade as a result of confrontations between them and humans while during the same period 536 villagers too have lost their lives. The loss of livelihood of farmers due to unexpected attacks by marauding wild elephants has led to vigorous protests, urging authorities to take prompt action. But, the matter needs to be handled with utmost care, for any lasting solution to the conflict would have to be one that saves the lives of both elephants and humans.
Yet, latest media reports quoted the DWLC as claiming that deaths caused by the HEC had declined in 2020 after the record of the highest number of elephant deaths in the world owning to angry villagers who poisoned the roaming animals or shot them to death in the previous year. The source affirmed that elephant deaths had dropped by nearly 22% in 2020 compared to 2019.
According to official statistics, only 318 elephants and 112 persons were killed in 2020 compared to 407 elephants in the previous year. These findings recorded a drop of 8% in human deaths since 2019.
Although the wild elephant population in Sri Lanka is estimated at 6000-7000 elephants, it is difficult to verify the accurate data with regard to their total number. About 70% of wild elephants in the country inhabit forest areas outside the protection of the DWLC, thus heightening the conflict.
There were reportedly over 19,000 wild elephants in Sri Lanka at the turn of the 19th century, but unscrupulous capture of these animals, hunting them for mere pleasure and killing them to avenge the raids on plantations have reduced this number drastically. According to Sri Lankan law, killing an elephant is a criminal offence.
Some of the measures adopted presently by the DWLC to resolve the issue include the use of noise, flashes and other shock tactics to deter elephants from trespassing on villages, establishment of new national parks in order to extend the conservation areas and of elephant corridors to allow safe passage of elephants from one habitat to another, translocation of elephants to sparsely populated areas, erection of barriers of electric fences between plantations and elephants’ territory and control of poaching mostly for ivory.
The DWLC was established in October 1949 with Captain Cyril Wace Nicholas (1898-1961) as its first Warden. He was a Ceylonese (Sri Lankan) soldier, civil servant and forester.
Another leading organisation that carries out scientific research for better environmental conservation and management in Sri Lanka is the Centre for Conservation and Research (CCR), chaired by Dr. Prithiviraj Fernando, an author and a Sri Lankan scientist. The CCR, based in Tissamaharamaya, in southern Sri Lanka, close to the Yala National Park, is a member of the Elephant Conservation Group (ECG), an informal network of researchers and practitioners who are working on the conservation of Asian elephants. It is a heterogenous group that comprises members from 9 of the 13 Asian countries with an elephant population.
According to Dr. Fernando, the HEC has kept on increasing because of continuous development of areas with elephants, without taking appropriate steps to prevent the conflict. “In addition, most of the methods that have been used to mitigate the conflict such as elephant translocations, elephant drives and electric fences on protected area boundaries, are ineffective in reducing the conflict and in many cases, increase the conflict”, He told Namo magazine Oct. 22.
There has to be a paradigm change – instead of relying on outdated methods and traditions, a science-based approach has to be taken, he said. “For over 60 years, we have tried to mitigate the conflict by restricting elephants to protected areas but today 70% of elephant range is outside protected areas. This shows that our approach has completely failed. There are very good biological reasons such as the carrying capacity of protected areas and the behaviour of elephants that explain why it has failed and can never succeed”, he pointed out.
Dr. Fernando argued that instead of pursuing something that cannot be done, one needs to focus on preventing elephant damage to crops and property and lives by protecting settlements and crop fields. “The most effective method of doing this is through community-based electric fencing, implemented through Divisional Secretariats and agencies associated with agriculture”, he said.
Dr. Fernando assured Namo magazine that the CCR has developed and implemented plans in pilot scale and demonstrated the effectiveness of its approach to resolve the conflict. “We have also worked at policy level to develop National Policy and Action Plans. Unfortunately, there does not seem to be any real interest in finding a solution to this problem”, he lamented.
In the past two decades, Sri Lankan scholars have embarked on a project to track the movements of over 100 elephants, resorting to GPS satellite tracking collars. One of the two last elephants remaining in the UNESCO World Heritage Site of Sri Lanka’s Sinharaja Rain Forest was collared in 2019 that enabled authorities to receive a signal whenever the roaming elephant entered nearby hamlets and to intervene in time to avoid any confrontation between this animal and villagers.
The government introduced electrified fences to solve the HEC in 1992. These fences carry a pulse of high voltage of around 12,000 volts DC, but very low amperage. The elephant, on contact with the fences, receives a thumping shock that throws the animal, but no physical harm is caused by the current. But some say that their use does not seem to be effectual, as the elephant, an intelligent animal with a good memory, can pull down the electric fences with dried logs with its two tusks in defiance and rivalry without being electrified.
Similarly, bee colonies and electrical nettings proposed to the wildlife authorities, seem to have offered no concrete solution to the problem.
Earlier, farmers planted cactus trees around their gardens to avert damage to the dwellings and cultivation. The sharp thorns of these plants held the animals at bay, but with the advent of the subsequent colonisation, cactus plants became extinct and parapet walls replaced them. These walls could not withstand the attacks of the wild elephants who easily toppled them and invaded the farmers’ cultivation.
Other than shooting and poisoning of the elephants, farmers also resort to trap guns, muzzle loaders and planks studded with nails left on elephant trails that kill or maim the animals.
An interesting local media report suggested the erection of fences with Palmyra palm (Tal in Sinhalese, Panai Maram in Tamil and Borassus in botany) in a zigzag manner. This Asian palm, thriving in almost all areas in Sri Lanka, mostly in the northern regions, except for regions with a cold climate, could be a practical solution to the transgressing elephants. As the fan-shaped leaves of this palm are rough and thorny, the elephants are reluctant to consume them and they do not dare smashing such a barrier. Its sharp thorns would pierce through the elephants’ skin, causing pain to the animals. Moreover, this tree lives up to 160-170 years. It does not need fertiliser and could be considered as an organic palm that grows up to 30m, with robust trunks. It is the official tree of the Tamil Nadu State in South India. In Tamil culture it is highly respected and regarded as a “Celestial Tree” as all its parts can be used for varied purposes.
The Sri Lankan elephant (Elephas maximus maximus) is the largest of the four sub-species of Asian elephants. The early chronicles of the island confirm an extensive elephant population that made their home here and a system of organised domestication and taming of these animals that dates back to the reigns of the ancient Sinhalese kings who kept them for military and ceremonial purposes and as a symbol of glory of their reign and for export as well. The elephant has been a protected animal in Sri Lanka since the 12th century AD. Wild elephants were the property of the Sinhalese kings and hence they could be neither captured nor killed without the permission of these monarchs. The systematic slaughter of tuskers began with the arrival of the colonialists and the introduction of firearms. In 1891 a British Government Ordinance banned the wanton destruction of elephants.
In that battle steeped in history of this country, that took place in the pre-Christian era in North Central Sri Lanka between the young Sinhalese prince Dutugemunu and the aged Tamil King Elara, a usurper from South India, both of them rode on two war elephants (named Kandula and Maha Pabbatha, respectively) to the battlefront to engage in an elephant-back duel in which Elara was finally defeated. It is also documented that the Sinhalese King Rajasinghe I used a phalanx of 2200 elephants during the siege of the Portuguese fortress of Colombo in 1558. Elephants also served as “executioners” under these kings when criminals, sentenced to death in the kingdom, were trampled underfoot to death by intoxicated elephants. They equally played an important role in the construction of cities and fortresses.
Today elephants serve men by hauling steel, timber, sand and other building materials. Without these richly caparisoned animals Buddhist temple processions would be far from being spectacular and impressive. However, the elephants who are kept permanently at temples as a symbol of status are deplorably chained and restricted in their movements.
In Sri Lanka, as in Thailand, elephants are also used in tourism to provide elephant back riding to visitors. The small town of Habarana in the Anuradhapura District in the North Central Province and Sigiriya in the Matale District in the Central Province are famous for such rides. The tourists offer them bananas and are taken on rides through the jungle, along the bunds of ancient man- made lakes and sometimes the elephants wade through waters, giving the visitors a memorable experience. Pinnawala, in the Kegalle District in the Sabaragamuwa Province, which has an elephant orphanage and an elephant museum, is equally popular among both local and foreign tourists and elephants take visitors on their back through the village. The area has also earned a name for paper manufactured from recycled elephant dung. ***
