Does Wildlife Thrive When Human Settlements are Moved Out of a Forest?

Nestled within the Satpura mountain range of Central India, the quaint town of Pachmarhi is known widely as “Satpura ki Rani” (Queen of Satpura). Because of its natural beauty and cultural heritage, the town attracts tourists from far and wide. More importantly, Pachmarhi’s position in the heart of the Satpura Tiger Reserve (TR) makes it the gateway to a landscape of immeasurable ecological value, home to a diverse bouquet of flora and fauna. While looking for potential ideas for my thesis, I found myself in Pachmarhi.

Our study begins in a classroom in Pachmarhi, where a local school invited elementary-level students to attend a workshop on the importance of conservation. Regional forest department officials were invited to address the students. I was fortunate to be in the audience as well. Using vibrant images of wild animals like the tiger and the barasingha, one of the officials explained the need to relocate villages (and villagers) from the tiger reserve to ensure the conservation of these species. With the students awestruck, the officer opened the forum to questions. A student raised a question that left the audience in splits. He asked, “When our village was relocated, an equally large tract of forests had to be cleared to establish the new village. So, how do relocations benefit wildlife and forests?” The question came from eight-year-old Raju, who belongs to the Korku tribe of Madhya Pradesh. His family is among thousands of indigenous people displaced from their ancestral homes to make way for wildlife conservation. Raju’s question echoed within my heart for days, and I wondered if village relocations actually benefit wildlife.

What are village relocations, and why do they matter?

Village relocations are conservation interventions that aim to reduce the interface between people and wildlife and promote conservation. Villages are relocated from protected areas and resettled outside, allowing the recovery of wild populations in the reserve. Relocations envision a win-win scenario — wildlife benefits from reduced human disturbances, while people can benefit from better infrastructure and fresh livelihood options. Practically, though, this is rarely the case.

Relocation entails severe sociocultural and economic costs for the communities being displaced. Forest-dependent communities that have lived in harmony with nature for generations are uprooted and tossed into an unfamiliar environment, making them vulnerable to exploitation. While relocations are supposed to be voluntary, research suggests that most cases involve coerced consent, and there are grave concerns about the efficacy of the relocation process as well. Studies indicate that the relocation process is often mismanaged, non-transparent and unilateral. With the lives of thousands of families in the balance, an urgent question arises: Are conservation-oriented village relocations viable in the long run, given their sociological implications?

The flipside – The ecological implications of relocations

What do relocations entail for wild flora and fauna? The absence of humans is expected to result in reduced wildlife persecution and exploitation of natural resources. With the human footprint receding, soil nutrition levels would change, allowing scores of plants to proliferate. With an abundant supply of pasture, populations of wild herbivores like deer and antelopes would surge, resulting in the recovery of large carnivores like tigers and leopards. The theory is — if humans are removed from the equation, the ecosystem will eventually reach a state of balance.

Does this actually happen? We do not know! The push for village relocations is driven mainly by anecdotal evidence rather than solid science. For instance, reports of the Forest Department claim that removing villages from Kanha Tiger Reserve led to the recovery of barasingha populations that were on the brink of local extinction. But in reality, it is difficult to ascertain if the recovery resulted from village relocations or other protected area management efforts.

Much of the research pertaining to village relocations has focussed on its sociological implications and there is little research on the ecological implications of relocating. This is a gap in current conservation research. 

A study on the ecological implications of relocations in Satpura

For my thesis, I wanted to explore how relocations affect forests and wildlife, and I chose Satpura TR as my study site. The Satpura relocation model is considered one of the most successful models of voluntary relocation in the country, and I wanted to explore this notion. In Satpura, the vacated village sites (hereon, “relocation sites”) are developed as meadows to attract large herbivores as a growing population of herbivores is necessary to cater to the needs of a growing population of predators like tigers and leopards.

Since the grassland management interventions that follow relocation are largely aimed at improving prey numbers, I chose five of the tiger’s favourite prey species for my study — sambar (Rusa unicolor), chital (Axis axis), gaur (Bos gaurus), nilgai (Boselaphus tragocamelus), and wild pig (Sus scrofa).

I wanted to understand if the activity patterns of these five species changed as more time passed after relocation. I also wanted to understand if the species were using the relocation sites (developed meadows) more than the surrounding forests. Using the volume of droppings as an index of activity, I ascertained how actively the five prey species were using different regions within the reserve.

Once my team and I were done sifting through the grasses, looking for poop, I crunched the numbers. I found that species sensitive to human disturbances (sambar, chital, and gaur) used the spaces more actively after relocation. On the other hand, I found that species tolerant of human presence (nilgai and wild pig) used the spaces less actively (than before the relocation) as human settlements provided them with opportunities to feast on nutritious agricultural crops. With these settlements gone, there was no longer an incentive to gather around these sites. Additionally, I found that all five species were using the relocation sites more actively than they used the surrounding forests. This may be due to the availability of lush fodder and clean water across flat grasslands enabling these species to meet most of their ecological needs.

The study suggests that relocations do accrue some benefits for conservation by providing prey species with habitats where they can forage and rest without having to worry about persecution by people. With time, populations of these species bounce back in the areas from where villages are relocated.

Village relocations and conservation – The way forward

While my study suggests that relocations bear certain ecological benefits for wildlife conservation, there is still an urgent need to study the sociological and ecological impacts of relocations further. Given that these are complex human-nature systems, we need interdisciplinary research to better understand the viability of relocations for conservation— not just of wildlife but also of indigenous communities with a shared dependency on forests. A win for one at the cost of the other cannot be considered a win in its true sense.

The long-term sustainability of relocations as a tool for conservation is contingent on the welfare it generates for forest-dependent communities and wildlife, in theory as well as in practice.