The Impact of Nepal's Armed Conflict on Conservation Efforts

While the people of Nepal have borne the brunt of the brutal seven-year Maoist insurgency, which has claimed more than 7000 lives, the impact on Nepal's environment, natural resources and conservation efforts also has been severe. Maoist attacks on forest and park personnel, as well as on army posts in protected areas, illegal logging, and poaching of endangered wildlife are all on the rise. Security forces are abandoning remote locations, leaving many of Nepal's protected areas to the mercy of the insurgents and environmental criminals. More rhinos are being killed in national parks for their horns. Nepal's Royal Bengal Tiger population is being hunted for its skin and bones. Illegal traffic in endangered species' products has reached alarming proportions: wildlife watchers report that banned items are being sold freely in Kathmandu. The severe decline in tourism has all but eliminated the livelihoods of many of Nepal's most marginal groups and dried up financial resources used for conservation. Deforestation is accelerating, and globally significant biodiversity resources are facing extinction. Economic pressures stemming from the insurgency are increasing as the conflict drags on, threatening serious ecological damage and Nepal's future food security.

The impact of the Maoist insurgency has not been limited to Nepal's national parks and conservation areas. The assault on the country's wildlife has been accompanied by a plundering of forest and other plant resources. Biodiversity resources of global significance are threatened. Nepal's community forestry programs, a model for the rest of South Asia, are reeling from the climate of insecurity. The conflict is contributing to migration away from food-insecure areas and hollowing out the rural economy. It is difficult even to assess how much damage has been done to Nepal's conservation efforts directly and indirectly as the result of the armed conflict. However, the longer the insecurity continues, the greater the economic pressures on Nepal's rural poor -- and the greater the eventual environmental toll will be.

National Parks/Protected Areas

Seventeen percent of Nepal’s landmass has been designated as national parks or protected areas. When conservation areas are included, more than twenty percent of Nepal is under some form of protection, one of the highest ratios in the world. These areas constitute Nepal's natural crown jewels and its chief assets for the critical tourism industry. However, vulnerability to Maoist attack has left most of these areas virtually abandoned by both security forces and park rangers. Official reports state that out of 112 guard posts in protected areas only 34 remain -- a 70 percent reduction. Nepal's conservation areas, which constitute a truly exemplary effort by Nepal to protect resources of global significance, have now become security problems. As the army exits these large, rugged areas, the Maoists have turned them into launching pads for attacks. Conservation scientists lament that because of security risks, they have been unable to conduct inventories, health surveys and other studies within the protected areas. Lack of information on the status of flora and fauna is greatly hampering efforts for conservation.

The insurgents also have attacked community-based conservation committee members in the Annapurna Conservation Area (close to the Maoist heartland). Even Langtang National Park, due north of the Kathmandu valley, which had been relatively untouched by the insurgency, has lately become volatile. Within the past few weeks, about a dozen soldiers sent to protect this park have been killed or seriously wounded in ambushes. Other national parks closer to the epicenter of the Maoist insurgency are largely unpatrolled. Numerous hotels and lodges within parks and in buffer zones have closed, eliminating livelihoods of people living adjacent to parks.

Eco-Tourism And Trekking In A Tailspin

Nepal is a premier world destination for eco-tourism. This industry had been under pressure since the royal palace murders in June 2001, and especially since the events of September 11. Maoist tactics have been responsible for an even greater falloff. Numbers of trekkers have plummeted as cases of Maoist muggings of tourists have surfaced. Those who do come face previously unknown hardships. For example, Maoists have turned pressure cookers into a deadly weapon, packing them with explosives and timers for use as land mines and time bombs. The army banned transport of pressure cookers into outlying districts and remote areas. Since at altitudes over 10,000 feet it is difficult to cook without pressure cookers, some tourists and trekking staff report having to eat half-cooked food.

Financial Resources for Conservation Drying Up

As a result, tourist entries and the revenues collected from tourists have plummeted, drying up the most important source of funds for conservation work. Records at some of the park entry points show a 40-60 percent decline. Fees charged to trekkers to enter restricted areas are no longer going towards conservation measures, but are being diverted to Nepal's cash-strapped general treasury to support anti-insurgency operations. Conservation organizations such as WWF have not been able to take up the slack, as declines in global stock markets have forced private foundations and other donors to reduce contributions.

Wildlife Under Siege

As security forces have vacated the forests, poachers have started to take maximum advantage. In Dolpo, a mid-western district bordering Tibet, Maoists staged a daring attack last year, killing more than 20 policemen. Poaching of rare and endangered animals such as musk deer and snow leopard is now reportedly rampant. Park officials say the number of snares and traps set by poachers has skyrocketed.

Royal Chitwan National Park, a heavily visited World Heritage Site and one of the most closely protected areas, is under growing threat. Only time will tell the fate of the Royal Bengal Tiger and the great one-horned rhinoceros that find refuge in this park. Chitwan Park officials report that, within the past year, 38 great one-horned rhinoceros have been killed by poachers for their horns, which are valued chiefly as an ingredient in traditional Chinese aphrodisiacs. On the other hand, no one knows exactly what is happening to the tiger population, since it is relatively easy to dispose of an entire tiger carcass, and enforcement personnel rarely venture deep into the woods anymore.

Flourishing Markets in Endangered Species

Even before the insurgency, Nepal had the dubious reputation of being a conduit for illegal trafficking in wildlife products, such as shatoosh (a fine wool made from the throat hairs of the endangered Tibetan antelope, or chiru) brought from Tibet to Nepal and then to India. Similarly, tiger bone and skins from India transit Nepal on the way to Tibet, China, and Southeast Asia. Wildlife watchers believe that the level of trafficking has now reached alarming proportions and that banned items are freely sold in the markets of Kathmandu.

Illegal Logging and Plunder of Forest Resources

The Department of Forests recently reported that insurgents have destroyed 40 out of 92 area forest offices in the country. Similarly, 190 out of the 696 range posts have been destroyed. This accelerating trend threatens to raise the rate of deforestation in Nepal beyond current estimates of 1.7 percent per year. Large-scale damage to this resource base could have serious repercussions on Nepal's fragile watersheds as well.

Reports indicate that illegal logging and other criminal activities have increased as local people are forced to find ways to make ends meet. Visitors and journalists who have dared to travel to such northern outposts of Nepal as Humla and Gorkha report that as a result of both the growing security vacuum and falling numbers of tourists, locals are resorting to illegal timber harvesting, smuggling lumber across the border to Tibet. Since coniferous trees in these high altitude areas grow slowly, the loss will be nearly irreparable.

Not only Nepal's megafauna, but also plants are at risk. Valuable species (some rare), such as medicinal herbs, are being overharvested for quick profit, either by villagers or the Maoists. If unchecked, this could bring extinction to certain species of global biodiversity significance. Further, in Chitwan and other parks, ecosystems are at risk because the security vacuum allows people illegally to bring livestock in to graze.

Community Forestry Takes a Hit

Community forestry has been another victim of the insurgency. Nepal has more than 11,500 forest user groups in nearly all of its 75 districts, with participation by about 1.2 million households, and has been lauded internationally for its exemplary success in reclaiming denuded hillsides through community forestry efforts. Years of painstaking effort by local communities in partnership with the Nepalese government and donors such as USAID and the Danish and British development agencies have resulted almost 9,000 square kilometers of forests being turned over to community management forests.

But now many of these community forests are going unmanaged and are practically abandoned. Villagers, caught in the crossfire between Maoist insurgents and army patrols, are staying out of their own forests, unable to either harvest the forest products required for their daily subsistence or protect their resources and conduct remedial forestry activities.

Diversion of government revenues from the forestry and other sectors into the fight against terrorism has caused serious hardship to forest officials and rural people alike. The department budget has been cut significantly this year. In addition, donor-funded projects have either been terminated or limited to more secure areas, such as district headquarters. Many local community forest groups are denied services for saplings, seedlings, technical expertise and other inputs.

The vast majority of Nepal's people still lives in rural areas and relies on agriculture for livelihoods. People depend tremendously on forest resources for energy and other daily needs such as animal fodder, medicinal plants, and building materials. Degradation of their forests threatens to break the back of the rural economy and will lead to greater food insecurity. This can only result in increased migration. The emptying-out of Nepal's rural areas, especially of younger, economically active people, is accelerating, with famine becoming an ever more likely prospect for Nepal's more remote areas.