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Farms that save birds

Despite the challenge of population growth, India has managed to sustain a remarkable record in the preservation of biodiversity. Yet it might be able to achieve even more if the parameters of conservation policy are extended beyond the purview of just sanctuaries and national parks. New research suggests that certain types of agricultural landscapes can provide substantial support to threatened species. A scientific study of areca nut palm plantations on the coastal fring es of the Western Ghats has found that they have high conservation value. This study by Jai Ranganathan, R.J. Ranjit Daniels, M.D. Subash Chandran, Paul R. Ehrlich, and Gretchen C. Daily, published last November in the official journal of the United States National Academy of Sciences, discovered a large number of bird species in a nearby intact forest within the plantations studied, in Karnataka’s Uttara Kannada district. Threatened birds such as the great hornbill and the Malabar grey hornbill were documented in the areca nut plantations, part of a forest-like bird community. Significantly, the cultivated area retained 90 per cent of the bird species associated with native forest. These findings are important because areca nut is cultivated in about 400,000 hectares in the country, some of it proximate to forests. Many of these are potentially valuable ‘farm-and-conservation’ sites. What is also indicated thereby is that farming and conservation need not be viewed as necessarily incompatible ends.

Researchers believe that it is possible for plantations to host rare bird species because they customarily pursue well-defined traditional agricultural practices. One significant practice is the interspersing of the areca nut with high value crops such as vanilla, pepper, banana, and coconut. This has enabled the landscape to acquire an integrity that helps bird species thrive. Such a conservation outcome matches the experience in Latin America where positive results have been obtained from shade-grown coffee. It has created human livelihoods while protecting bird communities. The policy challenge will be to identify all potential areca nut acreage that can be developed into quasi-conservation sites with no loss to their economic value. As the Karnataka example indicates, farmers may experience a net gain. Some of them might require funding and expertise to enable them to adopt the best practices that facilitate such a transition. Further, whether other crops have such a high conservation potential as areca nut is an exploration that must be taken forward. In the long term, it may infinitely brighten the survival prospects of threatened birds and the ecosystem that supports them.

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