Blueharvest for snow leopard8/24/2023 ![]() ![]() Significant supply- and demand-side market research attached to this project has demonstrated considerable. As stakeholders in a collective system, the villages are positioned as allies rather than rivals. Since 2018, the Snow Leopard Conservancy (SLC) and local and international partners have worked on a Darwin Initiative-funded project to start snow leopard conservation tourism trails in the NarPhu Valley of ACA (B. The careful fairness of the Hemis model is designed to prevent such bickering and respect the human ecosystem within the natural one. Outside the park, occasional kerfuffles have erupted when a village has decided a neighbouring settlement is unfairly taking the lion’s share of tourism revenue and enacted retaliatory measures such as roadblocks and access fees. Most of the fee increase went to communal funds shared among Hemis residents as direct income and to pay for improvement initiatives, including fences to discourage blue sheep from eating crops, predator-proof corrals and solar projects. Phuntsog and Tsering also raised park fees and capped visitors at 50 per day. This led to jobs for guides and spotters, and an entire secondary economy for locals: managing packhorses, renting fields for campsites, selling handicrafts and operating a women-run café in summer. When the scheme succeeded, more homestays followed, and a rotational system was established to make sure families took turns. And we have to educate the people on how important these animals are for their ecology and balance.’ The guards viewed their fellow villagers as potential deputies – they just had to persuade them that what they saw as livestock-killing pests were agents of economic opportunity.Ī first step was encouraging families to set aside a room that could be rented out as a homestay for snow-leopard tourism in the winter and for trekkers in the summer. ‘Conflicts come because snow leopards will sometimes kill livestock, so we work on how to reduce the conflict. ‘Hemis Park is a special place because we have both humans and animals coexisting,’ Phuntsog told me. Inhabitants had been relocated from India’s other national parks, but Phuntsog and Tsering saw an opportunity. Suddenly they found themselves with almost sole responsibility for managing all the animals in a massive, rugged area that contained 21 villages. Twenty years ago, fresh out of school, they’d beaten 2,000 other applicants in a written test and then a half-marathon at altitude to win jobs as Hemis’s government wildlife guards. Both are compact, soft-spoken men from villages inside Hemis together they have undoubtedly seen more snow leopards than anyone in the world. ![]() Two of Voygr’s spotters, Khenrab Phuntsog and Smanla Tsering, were shown special deference.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply.AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |