Nagpur: Chief minister Devendra Fadnavis on Wednesday said Maharashtra’s tiger population was expected to cross 600 in the next census from the current 444, as he laid out a new five-point strategy and pitched what he called ‘value proposition’-based tiger conservation.Speaking at International Tiger Day Summit organised by Forest Department at IIM-Nagpur, Fadnavis said scientific conservation had built a new ecosystem around tigers, biodiversity and tourism.“Villages were relocated from core areas of the state’s six tiger reserves and new buffer zones were created. Camera tracking and an AI-based early warning system was deployed to reduce man-animal conflict,” he said.Pointing out that 75% of the world’s tigers were in India, he said Maharashtra, now third in the country, was moving towards the top spot.Fadnavis said conservation would not last unless it paid the people who live with tigers. “Until and unless it becomes a value proposition for every stakeholder, no effort in conservation will succeed,” he said, adding the shift was already visible in villages. “For many years we heard about resistance from villagers to relocation. But today, the villages are saying give us a good opportunity and we are ready to shift. The tables have turned,” he said.The five-point strategy covers reducing man-animal conflict, a green livelihood mission around tiger habitats, a CSR policy to channel corporate funds into conservation, a sustainable tourism policy to create jobs and funding for forest protection alongside tourism.Forest minister Ganesh Naik said the character of the forest department was changing under Fadnavis’s guidance, with the department getting full support for its growth. New ideas were being put into practice alongside tiger conservation, he said, taking the department’s work forward.Naik said the department had taken up a drive to plant 300 crore trees across the state as a part of a wider effort to expand green cover alongside Maharashtra’s tiger habitats. “To raise the maximum number of saplings for it, tissue culture laboratories had been set up at five places in the state. The method allows large numbers of healthy, uniform saplings to be produced quickly,” he said.Eleven MoUs were signed at the event, including one between IRCTC and the forest department for sustainable wildlife tourism and another for a five-star sustainable tourism project.Fadnavis presented Asiatic Big Cat Society’s national awards for conservation work. Experts presented recommendations on community livelihoods and the green economy, CSR investment, tiger tourism and human-tiger coexistence. Delegates from Cambodia, Bhutan and Bangladesh attended the event.(With inputs from Sophie Hocquet)
