Allocating a Conflict-Mitigation Budget in an Elephant Corridor
Jhapa. A settlement of 240 households sits between a national park and a community forest, on a route elephants use to move between two forest blocks. In the past four years: one person killed, two injured, 14 houses damaged, and about 9 ha of paddy and maize raided each year; last year 60 households lost more than half their expected harvest. The district has NPR 3 million for conflict mitigation this year. Three proposals are on the table: (a) a 4.2 km solar electric fence around the settlement at NPR 4.5 million, requiring extra funds and annual maintenance of about NPR 250,000; (b) an early-warning and community guarding system with trained teams, torches and SMS alerts at NPR 1.2 million per year; (c) resettlement of 40 households out of the corridor at an estimated NPR 25 million, supported by the local government. The park's buffer zone user committee wants a decision before the monsoon planting season, and the local newspaper has run three stories blaming the park for 'ignoring people'.
1. How would you allocate the NPR 3 million, and on what criteria? Justify each line.
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Criteria: lives protected per rupee, speed of delivery, reversibility, equity, and who maintains it after year one.
Recommended allocation:
- NPR 1.2 million - early warning and community guarding. Two trained teams of eight, torches, whistles, SMS and public-address alerts, and a joint incident register. Fastest to deploy, covers the whole settlement and does not block the corridor.
- NPR 1.0 million - crop and land-use change. Replace maize and banana within 50 m of the forest edge with less palatable crops where agronomically viable, plus an input fund and compensation for the switch.
- NPR 0.5 million - physical barrier on the settlement core only (about 1.2 km, not 4.2 km), with a ring-fenced maintenance fund and written community maintenance rules.
- NPR 0.3 million - solar lighting at six crossing points and a grain-store hardening programme.
Reject the full 4.2 km fence: it is unfunded by NPR 1.5 million, severs the corridor, and electric fences in Jhapa fail mainly through vegetation contact and weak maintenance. Reject resettlement now: too costly, socially risky, and unnecessary if the corridor stays open.
2. Which policy and institutional instruments would you use to make the package durable?
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Policy instruments: wildlife damage relief under the prescribed relief guidelines (verify current rates before promising any figure); park revenue sharing to buffer zones (30–50%) channelled through the buffer zone user committee; and the buffer zone management plan and the community forest operational plan, both of which should map the corridor as a no-construction zone.
Institutional arrangements: a conflict-mitigation subcommittee including the CFUG, buffer zone committee, local government, park and police; a single joint incident register so all agencies work from the same numbers; a community compensation or crop-insurance fund for small losses; and training and equipment from the park's technical staff.
Co-fund the package from the local government's agriculture and disaster budgets so it survives beyond this year. Process relief claims within the prescribed period - administrative delay, not the elephants, is the main source of public anger. Publish the fund flow to the community.
3. What long-term land-use measures would you pursue, and how would you communicate the decision to the community and the press?
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Land use: keep the corridor free of new houses, fences and sheds; direct new construction to the settlement side away from the route; formalize this in the local land-use plan and the CF operational plan. Support households to shift toward less vulnerable crops and, where viable, toward guard employment and nature-based tourism so that living with elephants has an income.
Communication: call a joint meeting with the park, local government and buffer zone committee; present the four years of incident data and the funding lines, and state plainly what is funded, what is not, and why the full fence and resettlement were not chosen. Meet the newspaper jointly rather than separately, and avoid blaming either the park or the elephants. Promising a fence that cannot be maintained would destroy trust after the first breach - better to under-promise and keep the early-warning system running.