Huge increase in carbon storage in forests inhabited by elephants: elephant scientists

by ifham Nizam
Pictures courtesy Dilmah Conservation

Dr. Sumith Pilapitiya, Elephant Pathologist, former Lead Environmental Specialist at the World Bank and former Director General of the Department of Wildlife Conservation, speaking to The Island stressed that in the study undertaken by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) in Africa, it was determined that each elephant was responsible for a carbon sequestration service of USD 1.75 million during the elephant’s 60 year life-span.

“This shows that the benefits from a healthy and thriving elephant population is substantial. This is a revolutionary approach for valuing the natural capital of a country so that it could be brought to the market for carbon trading.

Species sequestration of carbon is a brand-new field. The actual carbon sequestration value of a Sri Lankan elephant needs to be determined through a study undertaken in Sri Lanka, but this is fully worth exploring. However, if this is feasible, the Government should ensure that these funds should be exclusively for the benefit of communities affected by Human-Elephant Conflict (HEC). This is another way in getting HEC affected communities to see elephants as an economic asset to them.”

Excerpts of the interview

The Island: Dr. You are in the opinion that thick forests don’t suit elephants, please elaborate?

Dr: Most people are of the opinion that thick forest is good for elephants. But that is not accurate. Thick forests are largely primary and secondary forests and these forests are not very suitable elephant habitat. Studies conducted in Sri Lanka and India show that in primary and secondary forests, the elephant density is around 0.2 elephants per square kilometer—which means that each elephant needs around 500 ha of such forests to forage in. This is because such forests have a closed canopy overhead and due to insufficient sunlight penetration, there is no grass growing on the ground. While the tall trees have greenery, even elephants can feed only up to the height that their trunks reach. The greenery above that is not accessible to them. That is why studies have shown such a low density of elephants in primary and secondary forests.

Whereas, in scrub jungle, grasslands and Chena after-growth, the fodder is fully accessible to elephants. Therefore studies have shown that the elephant density in such habitat is around 3 elephants per square kilometer—which means that each elephant needs around 33 ha in such habitat to forage in.

This is why I say that thick forest is not suitable elephant habitat when compared with scrub and grasslands.

Q: Are you happy with the elephants conditions in the Udawalwe National Park

Dr: Nobody who has eyes can be happy with the condition of elephants in Uda Walawe National Park. The body condition of elephants in Uda Walawe National Park is very poor, especially among the adult females, juveniles and calves. The adult males that are residents, who don’t leave the confines of Uda Walawe National Park are also in poor condition, but not as bad the herds. The adult male elephants we see who are in good body condition are largely elephants who supplement their diet through crop raiding which takes place outside the park.

Q: What are your recommendations to the authorities

Dr: When Uda Walawe National Park was declared a park in the early 1970s, there were large tracts of Chena land that was included. Abandoned Chena land is excellent elephant habitat. That is why until about 15 years ago, Uda Walawe National Park had a large population of elephants who were in good body condition. But if there is no human intervention to manage the habitat to be suitable to support the large population of elephants and we let nature take its course, through biological succession the habitat gets transformed from grasslands, which was a feature in Uda WalQawe, it will naturally and gradually return to forest. That is the process that is going on in Uda Walawe now. This process of biological succession makes the habitat more and more unsuitable for elephants. Then the elephants slowly but gradually die of starvation or leave the national park. If we want to retain elephants within Uda Walawe National Park, humans have to intervene in this biological succession process and ensure that the habitat is such that it is suitable to support the elephant population of Uda Walawe National Park. This has not been done.

During the early years of biological succession, controlled burning can be used to prevent the succession. Now it is much more complicated to address. Invasive species which are not palatable to elephants and other herbivores has taken over most of the old grasslands, further reducing the fodder availability. As I am not an expert on habitat management, I strongly recommend that the authorities get the expertise of ecologists and botanists—there are some top experts in Sri Lanka–and implement a program to restore the ecosystem to be more suitable for elephants. This should be given the highest priority in my opinion, particularly when one sees the condition of elephants in Uda Walawe.

 Q: On Cattle grazing in the Park…there were decisions taken decades back to put an end, what happened

Dr: The Department of Wildlife Conservation (DWC) has tried for many years to stop illegal cattle grazing inside Uda Walawe and virtually all National Parks in the country. Decisions were taken decades ago (and many times subsequent to the early decisions) to put an end to illegal cattle grazing inside National Parks. There is only one reason and one reason only that this has not been possible for decades. IT IS POLITICAL INTERFERENCE! Whenever the DWC tries to remove cattle from the National Parks, the cattle herders and owners go their politicians and the politicians put pressure on DWC to stop the eviction program. Basically these politicians, including Cabinet Ministers and even recent Presidents have been instructing DWC NOT to evict cattle from the National Parks. Basically, all these politicians are supporting an illegal activity inside National Parks—however, I am sure nobody is surprised to hear that. So as long as people vote and wildlife don’t, illegal cattle grazing will continue!

Q: On Elephant policies, You had discussions with President Wickremesinghe, what’s the outcome

Dr: President Gotabhaya Rajapakse appointed a Presidential Committee in the middle of 2020 to prepare a National Action Plan (NAP) for Human Elephant Conflict (HEC) Mitigation. This Presidential Committee was chaired by Dr. Pritiviraj Fernando, who is Sri Lanka’s top expert on HEC and Elephants. This is the first time an eminent expert was appointed to chair a committee to prepare a NAP for HEC Mitigation. The committee comprised of the key stakeholders and I was also a member of the committee. It was good that President Gotabhaya appointed a Presidential Committee to prepare a NAP, giving HEC Mitigation to the priority it deserves. Unfortunately, no action was taken to implement the NAP, since 2020.

In November 2022, President Ranil Wickremasinghe appointed a Presidential Committee to “facilitate and oversee” the implementation of the NAP for HEC Mitigation, as implementation is the responsibility of different GOSL agencies. Since coordination among Government agencies is not the best in Sri Lanka, a Presidential Committee for facilitation and oversight of implementation of the NAP was needed. While most other politicians would have appointed a new committee to prepare another NAP for HEC Mitigation, rather than use the NAP prepared under a previous President, rather than wasting more time, President Wickremasinghe wanted the NAP prepared in 2020 to be implemented.

The NAP is being implemented at present but at a slower pace due to a lack of proper budgetary allocations due to the economic crisis in the country. But we have been able to use fund under existing World Bank and Asian Development Bank to commence the implementation of the NAP. The first six to eight months was spent by the Presidential Committee in ensuring that the proper institutional arrangements are in place to implement the activities identified in the NAP. Institutional arrangements for implementation are critical for the sustainability of any program. That is why the emphasis was on the institutional arrangements. Over the last 6 months field activities have been initiated in the Kurunegala, Anuradhapura and Puttalam Districts. With additional funding, the program can be expanded to the other Districts in the future.

 Q: Your thoughts on elephants and economics/ Villagers could gain financially if elephants are looked after in the right way, your thoughts

Dr: Elephant conservation is possible only if the general public of the country wants to conserve elephants, particularly the communities that have to face HEC on a daily basis. Right now, elephants are only an economic liability to the local communities sharing their landscape with elephants. That is why we have so many elephants being killed every year due to HEC. Our objective should be to convert elephants from an economic liability to an economic asset to the local communities sharing the landscape with elephants. The day that happens, there will be coexistence between humans and elephants.

The challenge is how we convert elephants from an economic liability to an economic asset. It is globally accepted that sustainability of wildlife in protected areas depends on the local community benefitting from wildlife and the protected areas. Countries like Nepal have established “buffer zone funds” where a certain percentage from wildlife tourism revenue is directed into buffer zone funds to help the communities most affected by human wildlife conflict and for local community development work. Since we have a majority of the elephants ranging outside DWC protected areas, in selected locations we could try to develop community based elephant viewing tourism, where local communities, mainly the farmer organizations should be involved in it so that elephants become a source of income to them. This may not be applicable all over the country, but could work along tourist routes and near tourist hotels.

Based on studies undertaken on African Forest Elephants by the International Monetary Fund (IMF), it was found that elephants contribute towards carbon sequestration which could be of tremendous social and market value. As it turns out, elephants fight climate change by contributing significantly to natural carbon capture through an extraordinary way. During the time that elephants spend in the forest and forage for food, they thin out young trees that are competing for space, water and light by reducing the density of vegetation within the forest. The larger trees that are left untouched have better access to water and light and grow taller and larger than other trees in the forest. Elephants roaming within forests promote the growth of larger, taller trees. These trees, biologically known to be late-succession trees, store more carbon in their biomass than the younger trees consumed by elephants, had they been allowed to grow as well. Thus elephants actually increase the amount of carbon stored in the trees of the forest, compared to forests without elephants. The increase in carbon storage in forests inhabited by elephants is huge—as well as valuable. In the study undertaken by the IMF in Africa, it was determined that each elephant was responsible for a carbon sequestration service of USD 1.75 million during the elephant’s 60 year life-span. This shows that the benefits from a healthy and thriving elephant population is substantial. This is a revolutionary approach for valuing the natural capital of a country so that it could be brought to the market for carbon trading. Species sequestration of carbon is a brand new field. The actual carbon sequestration value of a Sri Lankan elephant needs to be determined through a study undertaken in Sri Lanka, but this is fully worth exploring. However, if this is feasible, the Government should ensure that these funds should be exclusively for the benefit of communities affected by HEC. This is another way in getting HEC affected communities to see elephants as an economic asset to them.

Q:I understand you are in the process of writing a book on elephants for the common man, please elaborate

Dr:(I am not in the process of writing a book yet, maybe later)

 I am involved in elephant behavior research because that is my passion. I have always wanted to do such research because I feel that the more we understand elephants, the better we will be able to conserve and manage elephants. As I sated earlier, elephants in Sri Lanka will be conserved only if the general public of the country are interested in conserving elephants. If the public, especially the communities affected by HEC see elephants as an economic asset, they will want elephants conserved.

So, I am very interested in working towards convincing local communities to want to coexist with elephants. So any publications I work on should be geared towards that objective. For that purpose, publications aimed at the lay person is more important than scientific publications. That is what I hope I will be able to do.