India launches app to decrease deaths attributable to wild elephants

The state of Assam, in northeastern India, has launched a cellular app that warns individuals of incoming herds of untamed elephants in an effort to cut back violent encounters between people and the land giants.

Clashes between people and elephants aren’t unusual in India, and have continued to rise in recent times. Elephants are turning extra aggressive as their habitats and pure corridors get downsized to make means for city improvement.

Developed by Aaranyak, an Assam-based conservation society, the app, named HaatiApp, tracks the actions of untamed elephant herds and warns customers in the event that they get near a collision.

Human-elephant conflicts within the state brought on greater than 200 elephant deaths and 400 human deaths from 2017 to 2022, the group reported.

“Fueled by a mix of a inhabitants growth and poverty, man has expanded his frontiers, whereas animals have discovered their jungles shrinking.”

The app additionally lets residents report elephant sightings, accidents, deaths, in addition to crop and property damages, and features a type that victims can use to hunt compensation from authorities entities in Aaranyak.

“The appliance will act as an early warning system about presence of untamed elephants within the proximity of human settlements in order to assist villagers keep away from detrimental interface with wild elephants,” Aaranyak mentioned in a Fb put up following the app’s launch this month.

Together with the launch of the app, Aaranyak additionally launched a handbook with data on utilizing solar-powered fences to maintain elephants away from people and property.

Assam can also be identified for its huge agriculture and quite a few wildlife sanctuaries, the place animals near extinction such because the Asian elephant and Indian one-horned rhinoceros search refuge at.

The state has the second-largest elephant inhabitants — 5,700 — in India, after the southwestern state of Karnataka, residence to greater than 6,000 of them.