World Wildlife Day celebrated in State
Source: The Sangai Express

Imphal, March 03 2016: As done in other parts of the State, the World Wildlife Day was organised today at Forest Head Office, Sanjenthong by People for Animals (PFA), Manipur under the sponsorship of Wildlife Wing, Government of Manipur.

The Day was celebrated with "The future of wildlife is in our hands", with African and Asian elephants being the main focus of global campaigns, as the theme.

As part of the observance programme, a mega poster campaign by volunteers of PFA scheduled to be held at Tamenglong was flagged off by the Principal Chief Conservator of Forest (PCCF) PN Prasad.

Prior to the poster campaign flagging off, rituals were performed by priests of different religions of the State including Meitei, Muslim, Hindu and Christian.

The 68th session of the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) on Dec 20, 2013 decided to adopt the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES), and mark March 3 as World Wildlife Day to celebrate and raise awareness of the world's wild fauna and flora, stated PN Prasad.

Custom ritual ceremony for World Wildlife Day at Forest Head Office Sanjenthong

The 'World Wildlife Day' is an opportunity to celebrate the many beautiful and varied forms of wild fauna and flora and to raise awareness of the multitude of benefits that conservation provides to people.

At the same time, the Day reminds the people of the urgent need to step up the fight against wildlife crime, which has wide-ranging economic, environmental and social impacts, he said.

Wildlife has an intrinsic value and contributes to the ecological, genetic, social, economic, scientific, educational, cultural, recreational and aesthetic aspects for sustainable development of human being, he added.

The theme supports the inextricable link between wildlife, people and sustainable development.

It is the responsibility of each generation to safeguard wildlife for the following generation.

He further stated that the situation of wildlife in the State is not encouraging as traditional hunting is still practice in different hill districts.

Survival of various species is now questioned and it can be only eased when there is development in service sector and bring a sustainable source of income for people residing in hill districts.

Development in eco-tourism sector is another way; he added and stated that protection of ecological sites, flora and fauna should be encouraged.

He added that the Keibul Lamjao National Park has been nominated for world heritage site and by 2017/18 UNESCO may give the tag.

Being a junction of two biodiversity hot spots, the State has exotic flora and fauna.

But due to excessive hunting and killing, many animal species are on the verge of extinction.

Among them clouded leopard, bush quail, jungle fowl, green pea fowl, hillock gibbon, hornbill, nongin (State bird) are few of them, PN Prasad said.

Efforts to educate the mass by organizing mass awareness campaign and convincing the people that without wildlife there is less chance of survivability for humans will be conducted in all parts of the State, he added.