‘M’laya transit route for wildlife trade’

SHILLONG, Oct 13: Meghalaya has turned into a lucrative transit route for smugglers who illegally transport wildlife items like ivory to countries like Myanmar and other countries in the Indo-China region.
Revealing this here on Thursday, Divisional Forest Officer Anu P James referred to data collected over the last 20 years which show that the Northeastern states including Meghalaya is being used a transit route to smuggle wildlife items.
Stating that poaching and hunting is prevalent in the NE states, she said that through continuous awareness programmes the wildlife crime rate has decreased and now people have begun to realise that hunting is a crime.
She also pointed out that synergy between the Forest department and Wildlife Crime Control Bureau is needed to end such smuggling.
She also said that the illegal wildlife trade is thriving because there is a belief in some countries that wildlife products have medicinal value which is not true.
Earlier, talking about the elephant-human conflict in Meghalaya, she said that elephants traditionally use a corridor to migrate and the Forest department demarcates such areas by geo tagging them. The department is working with the locals to address the challenge and has formed committees in several villages and armed them with firecrackers and torch lights to push the elephants away without any casualty.