Posted on 10 February
2010 - WWF outlined today the current top
10 trouble spots for tigers in a first-time
interactive map that provides a unique overview
of threats faced by wild tigers.
The map comes as many
Asian countries and the world prepare to
celebrate the start of the Year of the Tiger,
which begins on Feb. 14.
However, there are only
an estimated 3,200 tigers left in the wild,
and they face increasing threats including
habitat loss, illegal trade and climate
change, according to the map.
There is hope though,
as tiger range countries, conservation groups
and organizations such as The World Bank
will gather in Russia in September to lay
out an ambitious agenda for saving wild
tigers at a special summit.
“Tigers are being persecuted
across their range – poisoned, trapped,
snared, shot and squeezed out of their homes,”
said Mike Baltzer, Leader of WWF’s Tiger
Initiative. “But there is hope for them
in this Year of the Tiger. There has never
been such a committed, ambitious, high-level
commitment from governments to double wild
tiger numbers. They have set the bar high
and we hope for the sake of both the tiger
and people that they reach it. Tigers are
a charismatic species and a flagship for
Asia’s biological diversity, culture and
economy.”
In the lead up to the
summit, all 13 tiger range countries recently
committed to the goal of doubling tiger
numbers in the wild by 2022 at a 1st Asian
ministerial conference on tiger conservation
in Hua Hin, Thailand.
The map is designed
to raise awareness of these issues and help
tiger range states achieve this crucial
goal.
Additional threats to
wild tigers highlighted in the map include:
Pulp, paper, palm oil
and rubber companies are devastating the
forests of Indonesia and Malaysia with critical
tiger populations;
Hundreds of new or proposed dams and roads
in the Mekong region will fragment tiger
habitat;
Illegal trafficking
in tiger bones, skins and meat feeds continued
demand in East, Southeast Asia and elsewhere;
More tigers are kept
in captivity in the U.S. state of Texas
than are left in the wild -- and there are
few regulations to keep these tigers from
ending up on the black market;
Poaching of tigers and
their prey, along with a major increase
in logging is taking a heavy toll on Amur,
or Siberian, tigers;
Tigers and humans are
increasingly coming into conflict in India
as tiger habitats shrink;
Climate change could
reduce tiger habitat in Bangladesh’s Sundarbans
mangroves by 96 percent.
Already, three tiger
sub-species have gone extinct since the
1940s and a fourth one, the South China
tiger, has not been seen in the wild in
25 years.
Tigers live in 40 percent
less habitat since the last Year of the
Tiger in 1998, and they occupy just seven
percent of their historic range. But they
thrive in the wild when they have strong
protection from poaching and habitat loss
and enough prey to eat.
“We know that wild tigers
need protection, prey and secure habitat,
but these alone will not save the big cats”,
said Amanda Nickson, Director of the Species
Programme at WWF International. “What is
also needed is sustained political will
from the highest level of government in
the tiger range states and this Year of
the Tiger, and at the summit, these countries
will have the chance to commit to making
tiger conservation work.”
A glimpse of hope
Although the map shows
many trouble spots, there is still hope
for wild tigers. New camera trap photos
of a tigress and one of her cubs obtained
from a selectively logged-over forest in
Malaysia show that tigers may be able to
persist in such altered habitats.
The photo shows the
tigress checking out a WWF camera trap with
one of her two cubs. Researchers from WWF-Malaysia
working in the area have caught the same
female tiger on camera several times during
the last several years, but this was the
first time they saw that she had become
a mother.
The photos, taken around
September 2009, were from a camera trap
retrieved last month, and set on a ridge
of about 800 meters in elevation.
“This is really encouraging
to see a mother with her cub,” said Mark
Rayan Darmaraj, senior field biologist,
WWF Malaysia. “Such rare photographic evidence
of breeding success magnifies the importance
of this habitat for tiger conservation in
Malaysia.”
