Tigers: Fighting for Survival in the year dedicated to them (there can be no greater irony!)

The year 2010, is the year of the Tiger in the Chinese Zodiac. How ironic is it, that the year which is dedicated to the reverence of these great cats, itself poses the greatest threat to their survival....

The world economy is coming out of its recent traumatic phase and the demand for goods in the consumer markets is growing. But along with it, is growing, the demand for tiger skin and parts in the Chinese and Tibetan black market. With the additional threat, of this being, the year of the Tiger (in China), Tigers across Asia are in grave danger. Possibly, at the greatest danger, are the Tigers of India, because of it being China's next door neighbour and as almost half of the world's wild Tigers are found here.

Keeping this eminent threat in mind, it is imperative that, the government of India, the Ministry of Environment & Forests, the state Forest departments, the NGO's, the corporate sector, the media, the local communities, and the civil society, all join hands to ward off this foreign threat to our nation's pride.
Our future as a nation is linked to the survival of our Tigers; through their habitat, the rivers that flow through Tiger reserves, and through the role the Tiger's forests perform in acting as giant carbon storehouses. India can mitigate the adverse impacts of climate change, through the restoration of vast forest lands and forest areas falling under the traditional Tiger habitats, wherever feasible. Protecting the vast forest landscapes of our country, can be the only long term solution for tackling Climate Change.

The protection of the Tiger and its forests, directly has a bearing on the health and wellbeing of not only our nation, but of the entire world. As tiger populations, defacto, tell us about the health of our ecosystems and hence the quality of the air we breathe or the water we drink.

Hence, we as a nation we should not fall in the trap of making policies for deforestation and conversion of forest land into agricultural and industrial land, in pursuit of short sighted petty monetary gains. Rather, we should make our environment and development policies, such, that they serve the needs of our nation for centuries to come. Because with our forests, rests the future of not only our Tigers, but ours own as well.