Abstract
Crop raiding by wild herbivores close to an area of protected wildlife is a serious problem that can potentially undermine conservation efforts. Since there is orders of magnitude difference between farmers’ perception of damage and the compensation given by the government, an objective and realistic estimate of damage was found essential. We employed four different approaches to estimate the extent of and patterns in crop damage by wild herbivores along the western boundary of Tadoba-Andhari Tiger Reserve in the state of Maharashtra, central India. These approaches highlight different aspects of the problem but converge on an estimated damage of over 50% for the fields adjacent to the forest, gradually reducing in intensity with distance. We found that the visual damage assessment method currently employed by the government for paying compensation to farmers was uncorrelated to and grossly underestimated actual damage. The findings necessitate a radical rethinking of policies to assess, mitigate as well as compensate for crop damage caused by protected wildlife species.
Highlights
Agricultural lands close to protected areas (PAs) often face crop raiding by wild herbivores, which can be a serious problem for farmers whose livelihoods depend on agricultural produce [1,2,3,4]
Attempts to make a reliable third party assessment of actual damage are few, most studies depending upon questionnaire surveys and oral impressionistic information
The net yield trends observed with distance from forest are likely to be affected by other factors. (a) It is likely that there is a trend with distance from the park in the fertility, water availability, irrigation doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0153854.g007
Summary
Agricultural lands close to protected areas (PAs) often face crop raiding by wild herbivores, which can be a serious problem for farmers whose livelihoods depend on agricultural produce [1,2,3,4]. In order to avoid economic loss, farmers apply a range of protective measures. They include manual guarding, various types of fences, trenches and other devices [5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12,13]. The traditional fences are made using wooden poles and thorny branches lopped from nearby forests causing substantial damage to the forest. Destructive measures such as traps can kill or injure animals. A number of measures have been developed and shown to be PLOS ONE | DOI:10.1371/journal.pone.0153854 April 19, 2016
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