Human-Wildlife Conflict

Human-wildlife conflict (HWC) is on the rise globally, and is one of the significant environmental problems in India. In India, HWC manifests itself in several ways, such as wildlife poaching, retaliatory killing of/injury to wildlife species, crop raiding and livestock predation by wildlife species, injury to humans or human mortality, and destruction of property, houses and buildings by wildlife. Of these, wildlife conflict in agro pastoral contexts has been a subject of debate and great concern nationally, not only for its impact on the farmers, but also for the consequences regarding wildlife conflict. In India, HWC involves multiple stakeholders and multitudinous socio-cultural and environmental issues. Hence any study on this topic must encompass a multi-disciplinary effort that provides a holistic understanding of the history of wildlife, crop and livestock raiding, its nature and consequences and discuss various techniques that have been used or recommended to mitigate the effects of this crisis.