"Project tiger had been rated as one of the most successful conservation programmes but lately due to the fall in tiger population as well as cases of poaching and man-animal conflict, a need was felt to evaluate the actual field management of the reserves and if required, suggest changes in the management plan," chairman of one of the five committees set up for the task, R L Singh told reporters here.
"So far the actual field management evaluation of the tiger reserve at the national level had not been taken up by people who have experience in the field", Singh, who is also the former director of Project Tiger, said. To carry out this evaluation, five clusters have been worked out for the 39 tiger reserves with one chairman each to head them, Singh, who would be heading the cluster evaluating seven reserves, mostly in the Naxal-hit belt, said.
The decision in this regard was taken recently and the whole exercise is expected to be completed in about six months time, Singh said. Citing a January 2010 report of International Union for Conservation of Nature, Singh said there are a total of 3200 tigers left on earth of which 50 per cent are in India. For evaluating the reserves, Singh said seven factors would be looked into.
It would be seen whether the staff in the reserves was adequate and properly trained, existence of fire fighting equipment and damage caused and encroachment of tiger habitat areas by exotic weeds like Lantana, water hycanith and parthenium which are both non palatable and are fire hardy.
Adequate funds to compensate victims of man-animal conflict, studying the effectiveness of soil and water conservation as well as studying the damage caused by tourism are the other criterion, Singh said, adding it has been observed that uncontrolled tourism both disturbs the wildlife and pollutes environment.