Transboundary elephant raids: Farmers in Bhutan leave croplands fallow

GUWAHATI:

Farmers in Bhutan and India tend to leave their croplands fallow, fearing raids by elephants driven out of their natural habitats owing to anthropogenic or human-caused activities.

Data on farmers on the Indian side of the boundary between the two countries abandoning their fields is not available. A report in Trumpet, a quarterly journal of the Wildlife Institute of India, said 30% of their counterparts in Bhutan leave their land fallow, fearing crop damage.

The report cites a 2024 study revealing the scale of the challenge in Bhutan’s Sarpang Forest Division, where more than 40% of the households reported experiencing human-elephant conflicts (HEC).

“Alarmingly, 30% of farmers leave their land fallow, fearing crop damage. Elephants primarily raid maize and paddy, which are the most widely cultivated crops, but cash crops like areca nut, oranges, ginger, and cardamom have also been targeted. The cultivated area for maize and paddy was large as compared to other crops, resulting in the maximum incidence of crop raiding by elephants,” the report said.

The authors of the report are Ugyen Tshering, an officer at Bhutan’s Jomotsangkha Wildlife Sanctuary; Sonali Ghosh, the Director of Kaziranga National Park and Tiger Reserve; and Rupali Thakur and Anukul Nath of the Assam Forest Department.

According to its national elephant survey in 2016, Bhutan has an estimated 678 elephants primarily inhabiting the southern foothills bordering Assam and West Bengal. While these animals are integral to the region’s biodiversity, their presence increasingly comes at a cost to local communities, with HEC causing economic strain and social stress, particularly for farmers in southern Bhutan.

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“Farmers in Sarpang have observed a steady rise in elephant incursions, a trend likely driven by forest degradation and fragmentation, which push elephants into human-dominated areas. Yet, a significant number of conflict incidents remain unreported,” the report says.

One of the factors behind under-reporting is said to be religious beliefs rooted in Bhutanese culture, which encourage compassion toward wildlife.

“Local communities in Sarpang have predominantly relied on traditional mitigation measures, including keeping night vigils, making fire, and beating drums. However, many farmers view electric fencing as the most effective solution,” the report says, pointing out that only 0.65% of the affected farmers in Sarpang could afford electric fences.

Compared to their counterparts in Bhutan, more farmers in India – specifically Assam’s Bodoland Territorial Region (BTR) – are opting for electric or solar-powered fences and bio-fences, which involve growing “elephant-repellent” cash crops such as lemon and chilli around rice and vegetable fields. The study attributes this to support from local governments and NGOs.

Regional soft diplomacy

HEC results in about 300 human and 200 elephant deaths in India every year, apart from damage to about 15,000 houses and 8-10 million hectares of crops. One of the major critical stretches is along the BTR-Bhutan border, more than 250 km long.

During the late 1980s, present-day BTR experienced a severe socio-political crisis arising out of the Bodoland statehood movement, devastating the infrastructure of the region and causing large-scale destruction of the wildlife and its habitat, specifically the Chirang-Ripu Elephant Reserve and the adjoining Manas Tiger Reserve.

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The extent of the damage was evident from the eastern part of this landscape in 2009, when 14 people and 10 elephants died in conflicts.

The study calls for promoting “regional soft diplomacy by promoting multi-stakeholder groups such as the Trans-boundary Manas Conservation Area, a Bhutan-India collaborative initiative established in 2011 to address protected areas and biological corridors along the border between the two countries.

The study advocates exploring and implementing a variety of community and household-based protection measures, including cooperative crop guarding and fencing. “Creating awareness and educating communities on the importance of elephant conservation should be initiated by officials from protected areas and other environmental and educational agencies,” it says.

It also underlines capacity building and law enforcement. “The officials and local teams on both sides of the border can be jointly trained to enforce the law and also maintain relevant databases. Illegal activities that result in elephant mortality can be prevented by such joint enforcement,” the study says.

Published – June 29, 2025 12:24 pm IST