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Measures
for National Parks handover September 2003 |
The
Ministry of Forest has started work on the government decision to hand
over national parks and the management of protected areas to Non-Governmental
Organisations (NGOs) while retaining the Royal Nepal Army. Almost 4,020
soldiers guard various protected areas in the country. The government has
identified Khaptad, Shey-Phoksundo and Makalu-Barun National Parks and
Koshi Tappu, Parsa and Dhorpatan Wildlife Reserves as the potential sites
that could be managed by NGOs. Of all the National Parks and Wildlife Reserves
in the country, only Makalu-Barun National Park and Royal Sukla Phanta
Wildlife Reserve have no army presence.
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Bardiya
National Park: Black bucks facing food crisis May
2003 |
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Lack
of adequate water sources is posing a serious threat to Black bucks,
one of the endangered deer species found in the Royal Bardiya National
Park (RBNP) of Nepal, according to the concerned sources. Though an increase
in the Black buck population is good news, the animals conserved at Khairi
and Pataha region of the park are facing a food crisis. Black bucks graze
on grass shoots, however, a large swathe of the area demarcated the animals
lacks adequate grass during the dry season due to lack of water. The grass
in the region is dying because of the lack of water. |
A
single machine pumps water from a bore well to the pasture land, whereas
two pumping machines could easily irrigate the area to produce enough grass
for the animals, said Narsh Subedi, a ranger of the park. The animals have
been facing food crisis not only in the dry season but also in the rainy
season, as the grass grows taller, beyond what the bucks normally graze
on, according to Subedi.
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Koshi-Tappu
Reserve: Domesticated buffaloes removed May 2003 |
6,000
domesticated buffaloes that had been left to stray and graze inside the
restricted Koshi Tappu Wildlife Reserve all this while by the villagers
have now been prohibited from further entry.
The
removing of the buffaloes that have been straying in the northern submerged
region of Srilanka Tappu and those grazing in the southern part of this
submerged region is underway. The villagers living near the reserve land
had been allowing their cattle especially buffaloes to graze on the reserve
forestland during the night. These domestic animals inside the reserve
area of Sunsari, Saptari, and Udaypur have posed a threat to the wild buffaloes
found inside these reserve areas, which is enlisted among the rare species
of the world.
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Links
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Ethnobotanical
Society of Nepal (ESON)
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External
link |
King
Mahendra Trust for Nature Conservation
Annapurna
Conservation Area Project (ACAP)
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| Website
on plants launched |
Anyone
aspiring to know about medicinal plants across the country now no longer
have to go through the pages of various books in different libraries with
the launching of a web site containing database of the plants.
The
Royal Nepal Academy of Science and Technology launched a website of Ethnobotanical
Society of Nepal (ESON), a non-governmental organisation. The web site,
first of its kind in the country, contains information of medicinal herbs
across the country.
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Besides,
it browses information of nearly 500 medicinal plants. The web site surfer
contains the plants' uses, their habitats, local names, their status of
existence, their photographs, and so on. The database of more than seventeen
hundred medicinal plants in the country will be made available on the site
in the future.
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