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Western Ghats
Biodiversity conservation and human welfare

Summary of the
Proceedings of the first National Conference of the Western Ghats Forum

The first National Conference of the Western Ghats Forum (WGF) was held in September (23-25) 2003 at the National Institute of Advanced Studies (NIAS) in Bangalore. Over 100 scientists, foresters, amateur naturalists and environmental activists took part in the three-day conference. Dr S N Rai, PCCF Karnataka, inaugurated the conference. The theme of the conference was addressed effectively through 3 sub-themes viz.

  • Ecosystems, communities and species (Chair Dr S Balaji IFS)
  • Land use, people, economics and trade (Chair Dr P S Ramakrishnan)
  • Policies, law, awareness and communication (Chair Dr V Ramakantha IFS)

Further, through 8 Round Table discussions the following specific issues were reviewed.

  • Systematics and Taxonomy (Lead Dr P T Cherian)
  • Trade (Lead Dr Ashok Kumar)
  • Inventory and Monitoring (Lead Dr V S Vijayan)
  • Conservation strategies (Lead Dr V S Vijayan)
  • Economic value of biodiversity (Lead Dr K K Ninan)
  • Agrobiodiversity (Lead Dr N Anil Kumar)
  • Mining (Lead Mr Leo Saldanha)
  • Livestock and animal husbandry (Lead Dr S A Pasha and Dr S Paulraj IFS)

Plenary talks

1 Exotic flora of the WG P S Ramakrishnan
2 Conservation and livelihoods: what is at stake? Kamal Bawa
3 Impact of climate change R Sukumar
4 WG Databases and information exchange K N Ganeshaiah and R Uma Shaanker

Following is a summary of the proceedings highlighting the key points that emerged during the three days of the conference.

Introduction
(Kamal Bawa)

Dr Kamal Bawa introduced the scope of the WGF to the participants. The WGF is meant to be a ‘platform’ for 1) exchange of ideas and information, 2) addressing critical and complex issues related to conservation of biodiversity and human welfare and 3) networking the various stakeholders.

The WGF aims to adopt the following guiding principles that

  • Ensure ecological security (conservation of biodiversity and cultural identity/diversity)
  • Recognise and reaffirm the value of biodiversity
  • Ensure livelihood security
  • Ensure social justice

Dr Kamal Bawa justified the need for a WGF as follows:

  • The WG are part of a vast landscape
  • There are complex problems (conservation, management and socio-economic)
  • A multitude of organisations are involved in research and development
  • There is inadequate interaction between these organisations and other stakeholders and
  • There is a felt absence of concerted action.

The role of the WGF could be in

  • Promoting communication
  • Providing a platform to address complex and macro-level issues
  • Raising the profile of the WG (emphasising its global position as a biodiversity hotspot for example)
  • Involving civil society/bringing together multiple stakeholders and
  • Seeking resources for research, conservation and management of the WG

Networking could facilitate the following:

  • Sharing of research findings
  • Exchange of information
  • Field studies
  • Conservation education
  • Policy studies
  • Independent investigations
  • Collaborations
  • Development of new ideas

Dr Bawa finally outlined the way in which the WGF could operate. The outline was left open for suggestions and improvement during the 3 days of the conference. Suggestions were invited on the following:

  • Whether the WGF be a registered body
  • Whether government institutions also be members of the Forum
  • What could be the structure and function of the Steering Committee
  • What could be the structure, role and location of the Secretariat
  • Whether there is a need for other committees and panels

Immediate activities of the WGF that were envisaged include

  • Organising conferences
  • Drafting working papers/white papers on specific issues
  • Launching a newsletter
  • Launching a Website

Session I: Ecosystems, communities and Species

Four presentations were made during this session. These are

  • Biological Communities (R J R Daniels)
  • Rare, endemic and threatened plants (K N Ganeshiah)
  • Rare, endemic and threatened animals (A J T Johnsingh)
  • Invertebrates (P T Cherian)

Discussion

The following are the highlights of the discussion on the above four presentations:

  • The IUCN-Red List and the criteria adopted to be reviewed
  • There is a need to resolve conflicting recommendations that confront the biodiversity managers
  • There is a need for financial resources to review more frequently the lists of RET plants and animals
  • There is a pressing need to address the decline in populations of most RET species
  • There is a dearth of data to evaluate the impact of climate change on biodiversity in the WG


Session II: Land use, People, Economics and Trade

The following presentations were made during the Session II:

  • Conservation and livelihoods: what is at stake? (Kamal Bawa)
  • Biodiversity Assessment and Monitoring (B R Ramesh)
  • Human-animal conflicts (R Sukumar)
  • Medicinal plants: economy and trade (Darshan Shankar)
  • Dams, mining and plantations (M K Prasad)
  • Ecological history (M D Subash Chandran)
  • Economic development, tenurial regimes and NTFP (Sharad Lele)
  • National Biodiversity Strategy and Action Plan (RJR Daniels)

Discussion

The key issues that emerged during the session are

  • The need to emphasise the fragility of hill towns
  • The need for a broader view – looking beyond protected areas for biodiversity conservation
  • The need for a holistic ‘vision’ of managing biodiversity within a cultural landscape
  • The need to understand the implications of enhanced soil fertility in traditional agriculture
  • The need to assess the impact of the revival of local health traditions on wild medicinal plants
  • The need to consider the culling of some problem elephants
  • The need to integrate RET animals with plants in GIS-based conservation planning
  • The need to review success stories in community-based management of natural resources in the WG
  • The need to assess the impact of plantations on the nature of undergrowth and biodiversity
  • The general need to share protocols and results with others for better management of biodiversity in the WG

Session III: Policies, law, awareness and communication

Four presentations were made during this session

  • Policies and law (B J Krishnan)
  • Awareness and education (Sunitha Rao)
  • Protected Area management (A Rangarajan)
  • Communication (Sanjay Molur)

Key concern that was raised drew attention to the need for ‘attitude change’ in the forest dwellers. This is as important as patrolling and law enforcement.

Box 1: Biodiversity assessment and monitoring in the WG by the French Institute
(B R Ramesh)

Orientation/approach
Objectives
Assessment of biodiversity To study the geographical distribution and niche of species
To study the various ecosystems and characterize their spatial and floristic structures
Monitoring the dynamics of biodiversity To monitor changes in relation to ecological, human and social factors
To understand the process that governs its evolution
Vegetation maps (1:250,000) To understand the dynamics of vegetation in relation to bio-climatic gradients and regimes of disturbance
To map the spatial extent of 152 unique vegetation classes known in the WG
To create a database on the richness and diversity of plants in the different ecosystems of the WG
GIS to develop model for wildlife management – KMTR To assess wildlife habitats
To assess carrying capacity of wildlife habitats
To build baseline information for monitoring
To manage watersheds
To identify areas prone to risk of fire
To assess impact of development
To assess socio-economic impacts
To monitor land cover and land use changes
Species To develop an identify card for each species based on geographical, ecological, biological and economic profile and status
To integrate the data into a GIS including bioclimatic information (length of dry season, temperature, etc)
Biodiversity conservation and management To prioritize areas of conservation based on biodiversity indicators like species richness, endemics, RET and unique ecosystems/communities
To identify gaps in conservation
To derive management zones like core, buffer and utility zones

Box 2: Medicinal plants – economy and trends
(Darshan Shankar)

  • Export of raw plant drugs (including extracts) and finished products in the year 2002-2003 is as follows: crude drugs and herbal extracts Rs 6343 million; fished herbal products Rs 2397 million; total Rs 8740 million
  • Currently, this amounts to only 0.3% of the global trade in the herbal market
  • 75% of the export consists of crude drugs and extracts
  • recent trend of 20% increase in trade is of unfinished products and not of Ayurvedic or Unani medicines
  • Medicinal plants are well distributed amongst the different life forms – trees, shrubs, lianas/climbers, herbs and grasses. A small proportion of the medicinal plants are amongst ferns, lichens and algae (note: lichens and algae are no longer considered plants)
  • These plants are distributed across the different forest types/biogeographic zones/biotic provinces of the country
  • Conservation action has to be appropriately spread over these varied landscapes
  • Out of the 8000 species of plants with known medicinal use in India, 1000 are under commercial exploitation
  • The FRLHT inventory of plants in trade lists 880 species
  • About 100 of these traded medicinal plants are exclusive to the Himalayas
  • The others are widespread in the country
  • Important plants collected and traded from the WG are Coccinium fenestratum, Garcinia indica, Hydnocarpus pentandra, Vateria indica, Myristica malabarica
  • The forest departments of Karnataka, Kerala and Tamilnadu with the support of FRLHT have been involved in medicinal plants conservation since 1993
  • Maharashtra and AP have also joined in the mission since 1999
  • A network of 55 medicinal plants conservation areas (MPCA) has been established in these 5 states

Box 3: National Biodiversity Strategy and Action Plan – Western Ghats Eco-region
(R J Ranjit Daniels)

The NBSAP-WG Eco-region was prepared during the year 2000-2001. Over 200 persons including scientists, university teachers, foresters, lawyers, other government officials, and nominees of ZSI, BSI, NGOs, local communities, traditional health institutions and the corporate sector (planters) contributed to the Action Plan.

WG are amongst the 25 biodiversity hotspots that have been identified globally. An estimated 10,000-15,000 species of organisms are likely to be found in the many different habitats of the hill chain, Of these about 40% are endemic. The biodiversity of the WG eco-region includes 4000 species of flowering plants (40% of which are endemic), 938 species of vertebrates (36% endemic), 330 species of butterflies (11% endemic) and other lower plants and animals. Endemism is highest in amphibians (78%) and lowest in birds (4%).

The WG are a source of about 50 million years of history of which the past 12,000-15,000 years have felt the impact of humans. The 160,000 km2 eco-region is today shared by 6 southern Indian states viz., Gujarat, Maharashtra, Goa, Karnataka, Tamilnadu and Kerala. Around 40 districts fall within the limits of the WG. Population density is lowest in the Dangs in Gujarat (106/km2) and highest in Alapuzha of Kerala (1489/km2). The mode lies between 200 and 400 people per km2. Six districts, all in Kerala, have a population density over 1000 per km2. People classified as tribals (ST) are highest in Gujarat (14.9%), followed by Maharashtra (9.27%) and least in Tamilnadu (1%) and Kerala (1.1%).

There are 58 protected areas (13 National Parks and 45 Wildlife Sanctuaries). Nevertheless, the total area of 14,140.36km2 that is thus protected amounts to only 8.8% of the eco-region. The largest National Park is Bandipur (874km2) and the largest Wildlife Sanctuary is the Anaimalai WLS (841.49km2).

Major gaps in institutional capacity that the NBSAP has identified are:

  • Inadequate presence and spread of pressure groups/movements in the WG to address contention issues concerning the environment such as mining and inorganic pesticide use
  • Lack of taxonomic expertise, especially for lower organisms
  • Inadequate presence and involvement of trained socio-ecologists, anthropologists and economists in biodiversity research
  • Inadequate linkages for concerted action amongst academicians and activists
  • Poor understanding and implementation of existing legal instruments
  • Non-availability of reliable maps, especially Survey of India topo-sheets and spatial data for conservation planning
  • Lack of transparency and coordination amongst institutions/organisations working in the area of conservation
  • Inadequate capacity to undertake holistic research in the WG
  • Inadequate capacity in planning and implementing action research
  • Lack of capacity for documenting and effectively propagating successful models of conservation action

Some of the immediate management concerns (in the order of importance) are as follows

  • Grazing pressure
  • Demand for fuel wood
  • Demand for small timber
  • Fire, especially when recurrent
  • Demand for green manure
  • Encroachment
  • Demand for NTFP
  • Poaching and smuggling
  • Development projects
  • Land use practices
  • Pesticides
  • Soil erosion and water logging
  • Increase in human population density
  • Pilgrimage
  • Mining

Box 4: Learning for life: synthesizing ecological research with people’s awareness and education
(Sunitha Rao)

Focus

  • Learning for life – head, heart, hands and approach
  • Pooling back research data into local context or source
  • Small scale, localized, appropriate models
  • Vernacular context
  • Endorse all forms of knowledge bases at various horizontal and vertical levels
  • Program rather than project approach
  • Unbiased, neutral inputs
  • Secular – links with peace and ecology
  • Rural and urban components complement each other equitably
  • Sustainability and replicability of work
  • Exit strategy
  • Accountability – evaluation and monitoring

Menu for both formal and non-formal learning

  • Ecological ethics
  • Overview of WG and coast
  • Maps and spatial thinking
  • Forestry and wildlife
  • Agriculture, agro-forestry, horticulture
  • Fisheries and coastal issues – amphibious approach
  • Development and its impacts
  • Ecologically sane alternatives/choices
  • Flora/fauna checklists (names in vernacular where possible)
  • Resource inventory (people, organisation)

Target groups

Formal learning system

  • Students – balvadi to college, religious schools (gurukulas, madrassas)
  • Teachers

Non-formal system

  • Local communities
  • NGO
  • Government agencies – Departments of Forest, Fisheries, Agriculture, etc
  • Media
  • Scientists/academicians

Stakeholders with multi-level resource base

  • Politicians
  • Industrialists
  • Venture capitalists
  • Tourism sector

WGF and learning for life

  • Clear mission of forum
  • Layers of members – scientists, researchers, environmental educators, activists – equitable mix with no group getting marginalized within the forum
  • Clearing house for information – scientific, sociological, spatial, other
  • No compromise on scientific integrity or informationSkill sharing workshops/interactions
  • Effective networking

Box 5: Protected Area management
(A Rangarajan)

A certain range of issues are being examined. These are complex and in the form of a mosaic. The issues are dealt with largely from our experience and hence often biased. Issues are interspersed. The experience of the TN Green Movement may is being presented.

Strengthening protection

  • Forest department acutely short of manpower and equipment
  • Forest department not moving around enough
  • Many ways of enlisting cooperation
  • No participation with poachers
  • Effective intelligence gathering is needed
  • Effective prosecution
  • Pro-active management

Addressing needs of communities

  • Winning confidence of communities
  • Within and outside PA
  • Confidence building within PA, weeding misguided elements
  • More experience with shoal conservation
  • Addressing degradation from abutting lands
  • Our experience with TAP (TN Afforestation Program?) and need to build on such initiatives
  • Direct existing schemes to fringe focus

Conservation through participation

  • Case study in Theni: opportunity missed

Significance of non-protected areas

  • Need for concerted action – corridors
  • Strengthening the PA network
  • Many ways of enlisting co-operation
  • Sathyamangalam and Coimbatore issues, Kallar corridor and related issues
  • Prioritisation towards intervention in policy and legal frame-work

Inter-state coordination

  • Great need of this at all levels
  • Prosecution, intelligence gathering context
  • The agony of roads
  • Others
  • Much to gain as in Theni and Megamalai cases
  • ESA initiatives of TN Green Movement
  • The weir on Bhavani – advocacy case

Shola conservation program

  • Education in villages, creative components
  • The village depots with exotics
  • The shoal gas connection program
  • Enormous generation enthusiasm
  • Still only a small step made

Save WG youth network

  • Awareness rally along TN WG
  • Program in schools and colleges
  • The Malai, Mazhai, Manavar program
  • Identifying committed people
  • Challenges faced in guiding a program
  • Awareness kept up, rest is staggering
  • Sense of belonging, induced in local youth
  • They should ambulate in the forests, patrol and be guardians
  • Be the focus for initiatives as TAP
  • Study their local fauna, flora and ecology
  • Help compile the topo-sheet study

Summary of the Round Tables

RT1: Systematics and Taxonomy

The major concerns are

  • 1200 species are being added every year to the world’s list of extant species
  • India’s contribution to the list of new descriptions is comparatively less
  • Lower taxonomic groups are not well known
  • Lack of study of the ‘non-charismatic’ taxa
  • Taxonomic revisions are due at higher taxic levels (eg family, genera)
  • Conservation strategies should address lesser known groups of species
  • Lack of taxonomic keys/field guides to many groups of plants and animals
  • Lack of jobs/incentives/motivation/training opportunities for taxonomists
  • Lack of free access to reference collections
  • Permission to collect voucher specimens from protected areas/reserved forests
  • Need for guidelines to curtail excessive and unwarranted specimen collections so that genuine taxonomic work does not suffer due to red tape/bureaucracy
  • Expeditions should be multi-disciplinary in nature
  • Taxonomic capacity building in the lines of SACNET, BIONET, GTI etc


RT3: Inventorying and Monitoring

The key issues that emerged during the RT are

  • Inventorying and monitoring are complementary
  • Spatial and temporal scales have to be decided upon a priori
  • Effort invested in estimating biodiversity/abundance/distribution must be specified, and taken into consideration while interpreting the data
  • There is a need for greater efforts in inventorying and monitoring biodiversity outside Protected Areas
  • There should be a greater emphasis on biodiversity of invertebrates in general
  • Simultaneous monitoring of co-predators and prey could be useful in the conservation of predatory animals (eg Tigers)
  • It is useful to monitor selected focal/surrogate species (eg endemics, RET, indicators, flagship or keystone species)
  • There is a need to evaluate the impact of management/land use on biodiversity (eg JFM)
  • Target biodiversity should be prioritized and appropriate interventions should be adopted while monitoring
  • Inventorying and monitoring should adopt clear scientific/ecological concepts and statistical procedures and clarity of the level of information that is required (eg listing, abundance, population density, etc)
  • Taxonomic information should include geographical, ecological and population details
  • There is a greater need for simple keys and manuals for species identification
  • Capacity should be built in local people to inventory and monitor biodiversity

RT4: Conservation strategies

The key recommendations are

  • There is a need to identify important issues, threat factors and then concentrate on a few
  • To determine the WGF’s role vis-à-vis the important issues
  • Pay attention to the identified issues viz. fragmentation, habitat loss, grazing, people and parks, mega-development, wildlife-human conflicts, human settlements in PA, poor legal regime, invasive species, poaching, monocultures, pollution and lack of concerted action between conservation agencies
  • Need to prioritize amongst the above issues
  • Existing strategies, such as green certification that use simplistic criteria, are inadequate. These need to be reviewed.
  • In the WG there is a special need to identify special rewards for those agriculturists that help in conserving biodiversity
  • There is a need to address complex issues such as GM crops. The WGF must refrain from taking simplistic stands on such issues. The WGF on the other hand facilitate expert consultations on GM crops.
  • The WGF should address the issue of interlinking rivers

RT5: Economic value of biodiversity

Key issues are a) identifying current gaps, b) identifying priorities and future directions and c) identifying points for discussion.

Identifying current gaps

  • Need for stock taking and valuation of biological resources of the WG
  • The lack of valuation studies of ecosystem services and goods of the WG
  • There is no proper definition of ecotourism
  • There is limited number of trained environmental economists
  • Advanced technologies do not always reach the people who need it
  • There is a need for cohesion in economic values as calculated by different stakeholders

Identifying priorities and future directions

  • Valuation studies are required across the WG for ecosystem goods and services
  • Need for more studies on IPR and bio-piracy
  • Need for transparency and proper dissemination of existing data
  • Evaluate long-term benefits of maintaining pristine ecosystems
  • Introduce the norm of ‘green accounting’
  • Expand the PA network through investments in privately owned natural habitats
  • WGF to develop guidelines for ecotourism
  • Ecologists should be oriented to the basics of economics
  • Evaluation should focus on non-protected areas as well
  • There should be changes in the policy issues

Identifying points for discussion

  • When considering green accounting, cost accounting mechanisms are necessary
  • It is important to sensitize economists to ecology and vice versa
  • Millennium Ecosystem Assessment should be linked to economic valuation

RT6: Agrobiodiversity

Agrobiodiversity needed for food and agriculture. It sustains food and other agriculture. It is the building block for new varieties and breeds. It is the biological support for production and offers wider ecological services. Three characteristics of AB are

  1. Has to be actively managed by traditional people
  2. Cannot survive without human intervention
  3. Strongly linked to sustainable utilization

Agrobiodiversity can be assessed at both biological and ecological levels as follows

  • Crop diversity
  • Wild ethnic plants
  • Livestock
  • Aquatic diversity
  • Below ground diversity
  • Microbial diversity
  • Arthropod diversity

Reviews

  • NBSAP and KBSAP reports
  • Reports of MSSRF, Green Foundation and All India Organic Farmers’ Association
  • University of Agricultural Sciences

Gaps/concerns

  • No documentation of traditional biodiversity
  • No validation of documented knowledge
  • Need for a status report and action plan
  • Lack of validation of existence of AB eg home garden
  • No recognition or rewards for the communities
  • Improper land use and management
  • Changing cropping patterns
  • Lack of knowledge on pest management
  • No information on people’s priorities
  • Lack of information on human-animal conflicts
  • Lack of genetic and legal literacy

Emerging priorities

  • Need for localised seed wealth centres
  • Education and awareness
  • Development of home gardens
  • Striking a balance between conservation of biodiversity and productivity
  • Building up on traditional knowledge – incremental pathway
  • Socially valid species
  • Folk taxonomy
  • Appropriate soil fertility improvement techniques

Recommendations

  • Streamline and coordinate efforts of biodiversity conservation in the WG towards conservation of AB
  • Develop action support programs
  • Develop seed banks
  • Develop mechanisms of benefit-sharing by training local communities and providing market information
  • Generate political support
  • Research and documentation should focus on various ecological systems throughout the WG
  • Monitor AB and identify red-alert varieties
  • Develop an integrated information management system for the AB of the WG
  • Use modern genetic techniques to validate varieties and strains
  • Integrate recommendations on AB with the NBSAP
  • Enhance human skills and capacity of human resources that deal with AB
  • Provide adequate financial support

RT8: Livestock and animal husbandry

The RT aimed at reviewing

  • Impact on wildlife
  • Existing rules and regulation
  • Protection from cattle damage
  • Conservation of indigenous breeds of livestock

Impacts

  • Desertification due to over-grazing
  • Invasion of exotics
  • Forest fires induced by herders
  • Man-animal conflict
  • Anthropogenic impacts on ecosystems
  • Wildlife diseases
  • Competition for forage and water
  • Degradation
  • Removal of biomass
  • Competing with herbivorous prey species
  • Use of trained dogs for hunting
  • Cattle camps (marked as shepherd camps)
  • Pollution of water-holes
  • Compacting of soil

Existing rules and regulations

  • Goats banned
  • No grazing in protected areas
  • Regulated grazing in sanctuaries
  • No grazing in regeneration areas
  • Vaccination program in PA
  • Dung not to be removed

Protection from cattle damage

  • Reduction in unproductive cattle
  • Total prohibition of goat rearing in fragile areas
  • Research on cattle damage
  • Awareness on cattle damage
  • Regulated grazing
  • Amendment of grazing rules
  • JFM in all areas

Conservation of indigenous breeds of livestock

  • Protection of special breeds like the Toda buffalo
  • Inventory of all breeds of livestock
  • Preventing cross-breeding
 
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