KATHMANDU, Nepal, December 28, 2009 (ENS) – To mark 2010 as Year of the Tiger, the government of Nepal has announced the expansion of Bardia National Park in the Terai Arc landscape by 900 square kilometers (347 square miles), which will increase critical habitat for wild tigers. Prime Minister Madhav Kumar Nepal says the government will establish a National Tiger Conservation Authority as well as a Wildlife Crime Control Committee. “The solutions will be area specific, but the future of conservation will depend upon how we act now and how we make tiger conservation and overall biodiversity much more valuable to the livelihoods of local communities,” the Prime Minister said. “This is indeed a great conservation initiative, which will certainly help in curbing illegal wildlife trade and poaching in Nepal,” said Anil Manandhar, country representative of WWF Nepal. “We are confident that by embracing innovative conservation strategies Nepal will succeed in doubling its number of endangered tigers.” Earlier this year, the first ever nationwide estimate of Nepal’s tiger population revealed the presence of 121 breeding tigers in the wild within four protected areas of Nepal. In the early 1900s, tigers roamed throughout Asia and numbered over 100,000, according to the Secretariat of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species, which points to current estimates indicating that less than 3,500 of these tigers remain in the wild. Tigers are today primarily poached for their skins but almost every part of a tiger’s body can be used for decorative or traditional medicinal purposes. Most tigers are now restricted to small pockets of habitat, with several geographical populations literally teetering on the brink of extinction. …
Year of the Tiger Dawns With Just 3,200 Wild Tigers Left
