A very good evening to, good afternoon to all of you. So, I'm Doctor Dey from India, and today we'll talk about the human interactions with big cats in India. So by big cats, when I say big cats, I mean especially tigers and leopards.

So if we talk about the tiger, the India holds just 25% of the tiger habitat, but still, we have 70% of all remaining wild tigers, and the number is around 3000 tigers today. It's somewhere around 296-4792967, I guess. .

And then another big cat which we have in India is leopard, which is Panthera parasusca. And as for the 2015 census, the estimated India's leopard population is somewhere between 12,000 to 14,000 individuals. And of course tiger and leopard, both are Schedule one species.

And as for the Indian Wildlife Protection Act of 1972, and the leopards are in the vulnerable as per the IUCN Red List. So, actually we have a very long history with these big cats, bird bite, because I could find this photograph in the literature in which the panther is being shown that it is attacking a man, Roman fresco in the Sala della it's, it's a place in Rome, 65 to 68 AD somewhere around that time. And in South Africa also there were such cases found, so you can see by the photograph how old it is and how old our association with the big cats and other wild animals is.

So we have been living with these wild animals and the big cats since over the years. But now what has happened is that somewhere we find positive interactions and somewhere we find negative interactions. So as I'm talking about the tiger distribution in India, you can see the map shown here.

So the total number is 2967, and it has been distributed in different states of our country, as you can see. And it has been shown that the number has been increasing over the years. Like in 2006 it was 1411, then 2010 it was 1706.

Then 2014 it was 2226. And finally now presently it's 2967. And state wise also it is being shown that we have the largest number of the tigers in the state of Madhya Pradesh, followed by Uttarakhand, then, sorry, Karnataka.

And then Uttarakhan. So this is the distribution of the tiger, same way you can see the distribution of the leopards as well. Actually, we are more into tiger population estimation because it's much more charismatic species.

Both are Schedule 1 species, but somehow the social status of the tiger is much higher than the leopards because maybe because of the numbers as well, because tigers are only 2967, and leopards are around 12. T12,000 to 14,000 and most of the like budget and the government focuses on tigers, so leopards are somewhere left behind when we talk of the tigers, but both of us, both of the big cats are important for us in India. So the leopards are also distributed in India widespread and in human.

Dominated landscapes and 25% of the 35 Indian states and union territories, they have confirmed the presence of leopards, so they are more widely spread in India rather in comparison to tigers. So these are some pictures which show that people do have a positive interactions. They are pro-conservative.

They want to conserve tigers and leopards, and they do celebrate such days to create awareness campaigns among the people about the positive interactions and the value of leopards and tigers, the big cats to us. So this is some pictures which are showing that they are celebrating International Tiger's Day, but the people who live just adjacent to the forest area, they are somehow not very positive about the tigers and leopards because they are facing losses. Either livestock loss or say the human life loss, so they are not that positive towards the tigers and the leopards, and this is what causes conflict among them.

So these are some pictures which are showing that people are celebrating International Snow Leopard Day, and there is also a stamp issued by the government of India on to. Increase the awareness about snow leopard. So snow leopard is drawn on that stem, and it has been issued by government of India.

There are government sectors and as well as non-government organisations who are working for the conservation of the big cats in India, and they are making people aware. They want that there should be participation of the people in this, but when? As someone loses a person from his or her family, then it's very difficult to convince them about the conservation of leopards or tigers.

So this is the main biggest challenge for us to convince the people when they have already suffered from a loss. And this is especially in Kerala. They have a festival called Onam, and they celebrate it as a dance, so they call it Pulikali.

So Puli means leopard and khali means a play. So they depict it in terms of a play or a dance, and they create, they spread the awareness about the conservation of the leopard and the tigers, and it has been, it is celebrated in Kerala state. Now these are some pictures which show the negative interactions, and we can say human by life conflict.

You can see the first picture is of a tiger and the another one is of leopard. So they are so close to the human habitation, and you can see the people, a lot of people are there, so even the tiger is panicking. He is taking the people as a threat, and in this situation of panic.

The tiger or the leopard, they happen to end up in attacking the people. It's not that they want to attack, but it is that they have, they feel threat from the people, and in that panic, to safeguard themselves, they end up attacking people. So people should also have this knowledge that they don't have to come very near to the wildlife, and they should let them.

Alone in peace. Like in India, the interface, there is an interface between forest and rural inhabitants is a continuum, like it's continuous, so the leopards, they have adapted to live in the fringes of the human habitations due to the behaviour, plasticity, then wide choice of prey adaptability to survive on wide range. Human altered habitats and the smaller and adaptable leopard is most often implicated in attacks on people.

So today, human leopard conflicts are reported across India with major hotspots being these states which are Uttarakhand where I reside, then it's West Bengal, Himachal Pradesh, Gujarat, and Maharashtra. These states have a number of conflicts. Large number of conflicts of la.

However, the Indian leopard is reclusive in nature, but of late it is increasingly venturing into the human habitation because of the dwindling prey base, habitat loss, and poaching. There it preys on dogs, sheep, goat, and young ones of the cattle. So occasionally it attacks humans, particularly children and women.

So what the problem is that because the forest is decreasing, the forest area is decreasing, deforestation is happening, fragmentation of habitat is happening, and habitat loss is happening. So the Habitat for the leopards and the tigers is decreasing day by day. So that is why they don't have any option but to stray into the residential area, and in this situation.

They don't want to attack people, but due to accidental encounters, which are inevitable because both of them are in the same space. So those accidental attacks are sometimes fatal also. And they raise some kind of negative thoughts about them in the people, in the mind of the people, and most of the times like they say that because in India, there's no culture of private game reserves, all the tiger reserves, all the private protected areas.

All the zoological gardens, everything is under the control of the government. There is no private ownership. So what the people tell us, the forest department, they say that you only are the owner of these animals and you are responsible for them, whatever they are doing, so you have to take care of them.

So you can understand that there is no participation and no ownership of people. That is why they are not pro-conservative. But yes, of course, some organisations are there and some people are also there who are pro-conservative, but the majority are nowadays turning into against the conservation.

Because of the increasing number of conflict, these are some other pictures. From different states of India, these have actually happened. These are all natural clicks and these situations have actually happened.

So you can see that the leopard is straying in this . Crop in the crop field and in the second picture also you can see the same situation. In one picture you can see that it's just at the boundary of the wall of the house.

So, even people are at fault because when they see that leopard is there, so they should not approach too close to these animals. But I don't know why like they. They, what they think and they think that we can control this animal and we can capture and remove, and sometimes they are so angry that they think they want to go for the retaliatory killing of the leopard.

Like if the leopard has killed their pet or if the leopard has killed their. Like child or some other family person, so they actually want to kill the leopard, and there are incidences where we have seen that people have killed the leopard or the tiger, or they have burned them alive. The whole crowd, the whole mob, they have burned them alive.

So there are situations like this. These are some pictures showing the tiger conflict. So one of these pictures is from Delhi Zoo.

The very right topmost picture is from Delhi Zoo, and you can see because this person was intoxicated that he was under the control of alcohol under the effect of alcohol, so he just jumped into the enclosure. In the zoo, in Delhi zoo. So we cannot say that there is any fault of tiger.

So we are to be to be blamed if such situations happen. In the lower the right picture, one photographer was taking the picture of the tiger in tiger reserve, and he went very close to the tiger. Which is not advisable at all, so the tiger attacked him and then.

Though it was their fault, but still, you can see that Tiger is being beaten up. In many parts of India, leopards live in close proximity to the human habitations. With surprisingly low levels of conflict, so there are areas where the people, they don't have any problem in coexistence because over the generations they have been living with these animals in the fringes of the forest area and they have their own.

Beliefs and they also believe in some kind of that god or goddess they reside inside the forest. And if they will do the deforestation or if they'll not take care of the wild animals, then that god or goddess would be angry. So such beliefs are also there in India, and due to those beliefs, those people, they are pro-conservative.

And they happily live with these wild animals. And whenever such a, such an incident happens that some leopard or tiger has killed someone or attacked someone, so they are so, they are so strong believers of their traditional things that they think that because we have done something wrong, we have got. The trees in the forest or done something wrong, so that is why the god or goddess of the forest, they are angry and such event has happened.

So there are a number of schools of thoughts in India about these big cats, and people behave differently. So if we go through the primary drivers, if you think why why this conflict is happening, what are the what are the primary drivers, what are the factors which are leading to these conflicts. So of course the first and foremost and very important one is explosion of human population.

So you can see that humans are to be blamed more, and animals they have less fault. But we never blame ourselves. We always say the conflict animal.

We never say the conflict human being, but of course we are. To be blamed first because of the human population explosion, the anthropogenic pressure is also increasing because we are so many in number that we need land to live. We need land to grow the crops, and then we need fodder, we need fuel, so we are creating.

A lot of anthropogenic pressure on the forest areas. Then there is a very narrow human. Livestock wildlife interface.

Like there is no space left now. Earlier, what happened, there used to be a core area. Then there used to be a buffer area around the reserve.

Still they have, but it's not that effective now. And then the residential area was there. But now what is happening, people are just living adjacent to the core area of the forest, so there is no gap in between.

So of course the chances of attacks, accidental encounters, and straying off the wild animals into the residential areas. Let it be leopard, tiger, other wild animals, let it be elephant for crop breeding, so it's now very common. And then the habitat fragmentation due to linear developments like we will establishing like roads, railway tracks are going through the forests.

So all these kind of highways, these kind of linear developments, they are somewhere fragmenting the habitats, and they are discontinuing the corridors of the animals where they used to move and a number of corridors are now being crisscrossed, transacted by the. Roads and railway tracks and wild animals are facing problems of their migration and movement. Then lack of policy for surplus population of wild animals actually in India, as in other countries, you know, that culling is not that difficult.

Euthanasia is common, but in India we have such a strict Wildlife Protection Act that we cannot cull the animals. There is a provision of euthanasia and culling, but the process is so lengthy and more than that, there are a number of animal activists who don't allow culling and euthanasia. They make a lot of human cry if some animal is to be euthanized or culled.

So even if we know that the animals have exceeded in this area, they are more than the carrying capacity of these areas, but still we cannot do culling. For surplus population. Management.

Then there is a change in behaviour and food habits of big cats because now they are. Living in a different kind of habitat, in a fragmented habitat, and they are more living more close to the people and they are now seeing people daily. So the people are not more A very like a rare thing for them to see.

They have stopped reacting to them. They have stopped being scared of them, so they have accepted them as someone in their natural habitat and sometimes as their natural prey as well, like the livestock. So now they have started thinking because it's an easy prey.

They don't have to make much efforts for getting the stray dog or a goat or like cattle, so they are going towards the easy prey. Then of course the blocked and nonfunctional wildlife corridors because their corridors are blocked or discontinued, so they have to take different routes, and those routes might go through the residential population. And the decreased tolerance power of people is also a very important factor because earlier what happened, people used to coexist.

They used to give importance to the animals as well. And of course like we think that those people were primitive, but they have a very good idea of how many animals of which species should be hunted. Because earlier hunting was allowed in India as well, but those people, they really had that knowledge, that traditional knowledge.

They never hunted the animals in excess, so they had always kept this thing in mind, but now, now we don't care about these things. And people are not at all tolerant of coexistence, and whenever they It's not that always any loss happens, but even if the sight, they see the animal around their houses, then they just demand that you should remove this animal or you should kill this animal. And this there is a communication gap also between forest department and community because they don't often have dialogue with each other.

So this is important that they should talk to each other and the government department should also try to tell them about their values, their roles in the ecosystem, and how they can participate in the conflict mitigation. And another one factor important is unmanaged population of stray dogs. Because there are a number of stray dogs, and they always attract the carnivores to their houses or the colonies, residential colonies, then there are some secondary factors based on the primary factors which are also responsible, like changed behaviour of the leopard or the tiger.

Because of the changed habitat, because of the changed behaviour of the people, because of their closeness with the people, their behaviour is also changed. And that is why there are more chances of accidental encounters now. Their movement pattern has changed.

Like earlier, what happened was that these carnivores, they don't want to . Come in, they don't want to interact, they don't want to see people. They stay away from them and they don't, they move spatially in the dark hours at the dusk or the dawn time.

But now they are freely moving in the daytime and the people also, they don't, understand they come for fuel or fodder inside the forest. There are restrictions from forest department that they don't have to come inside the forest, but because they are totally dependent on the forest, they have been living in the forests over the years, so they don't stop coming inside the forest, and the encounters happen and the casualties also happen and low economic status of the people. So because of their low economic status, they are well aware that there is a risk to their life if they go inside the forest.

And we also tell because we have deployed camera traps, so we know the locations where the leopard is moving or where the tiger is moving, and we also know which one is the conflict one, which animal is going more into the straying more into the residential area, and we tell them that this is the location where you should not go. But just because they have to. Get the fuel.

They have to get the fodder, and they have nothing, no other livelihood, no earning, so they are willingly risking their lives and dependency of the people in the forest, low willingness to accept the threat of the leopard encounters is another factor responsible for this. And if we talk about the type of conflicts, then it can be in form of human injury or death, livestock injury or death, crop breeding in case of elephants, and property damage also in case of elephant, and then psychological stress and fear, of course, because when they know that the animal is moving around, so they are, they are in constant under constant psychological stress and fear. And the nature of the conflict can be either accidental encounter or it can be an intentional attack in case of a habitual conflict animal.

Most of the time it's, of course, accidental encounter. We had done one study in our Rajati Tiger zone. So out of 24 attacks, cases of casualties, there were only Two, which were intentional, which looked as intentional.

Otherwise they were all accidental encounters because like people were going inside the forest for the nature's call or the person had come, you know, he or she was living on the rent. He was not knowing about the local area, so they went inside the forest at the wrong time, so they got attacked. So most of them are accidental encounters, but sometimes.

The animal is habitual of attack, and they. Take human being, they start taking human being as their normal prey, so that leopard or that tiger is declared as a man eater. But there is a legal process to declare that we cannot say, we cannot use the word man eater very easily.

There is a committee and under the chief wildlife warden of the state, and then they see how many or what is the frequency of the attack, what is the behaviour of the animal, and all they study all that, and then only they come to the conclusion whether it's, it can be declared as man-eater or not. Now, what causes conflict? There are some things like killing of the livestock.

The tigers readily kill domestic ungulates and such kind of predation in the government-owned forest or common like see there we have a scheme, government scheme of relocation of the people who are living inside the forest. So what government does is that they relocate those people and in return they give them. A piece of land or maybe cash or maybe land whatever they want.

Either of these can be given, but what they do is they go out of the forest area wherever the land is allotted to them, but they don't take their livestock with them. The livestock is still grazing inside the forest area. So of course when the livestock is inside the forest area and carnivores are there, so the livestock would get killed and there's nobody to watch because the people are now relocated outside and they have left their livestock inside the forest to graze.

So, but when the livestock is killed, then they come and they say that we are the owners and we want compensation. So killing of the livestock end up in conflict. And then accidental killing of the human beings.

This is I talked about this. So this is another form of conflict. Then men eating behaviour when some animal develops this behaviour, then this is a very serious kind of conflict.

And in such cases, all the efforts are done to capture that animal. And if it's healthy enough, it is shifted to the rescue centre, rehabilitated. And if like we have any option that we can release it in the natural habitat, then it is done, at a very far interior place.

And now the conflict mitigation process if we talk about the process, it can be a three-tier approach in which the education, conservation and research, everything is included. Because if we will not educate the people, they'll not feel their ownership, there are no, there'll be no people public participation, and until unless there is public participation in the mitigation process, we cannot be successful in doing that. So there are some legal issues when we go for mitigation, like I said, that wildlife management in India is carried on Wildlife Protection Act of 1972, which is very strong preservationist in the thrust.

So it, it does not allow to cull. Any animal There is a different process of going for euthanasia. There's a different committee made, and people are committee members, and they can, after studying the case, they can only take the decision whether the animal is to be euthanized or not.

And the act makes it virtually illegal to kill or capture the animals even when the problem animals are involved in severe conflict situations. Like it's not very easy. This decision by the government is not very easy to kill or capture the animal.

So it's a bit difficult in other country. To take the decision and because there are only a few people who are authorised, the government officials or the agents authorised by the chief wildlife warden, every state has one chief wildlife warden who can authorise such killings or captures. It's not that we have a problem animal and the veterinarian is there, so he can or she can just go and capture the animal.

No, we cannot do it without the permission of Sevier warden. And in case of endangered species like tigers, the necessary authorizations can only be issued by the Director General Wildlife Preservation, who sits in Delhi, in the centre of India, and based on the application made by the Chief File Boon. So Chief Wildlife Gordon also has to discuss this case with the director general.

So you can see that it's a bit difficult process. Then there are lethal controls like we can kill the animal or we can capture the animal, so it's killing of the problem animal. Sometimes what happens at Got is not doing that, but people are so angry that in retaliation.

If the tiger or the leopard has killed their livestock. What they do is that they poison the carcass. And Animal comes and it eats that carcass and it just gets killed.

So people do some do things like this because they say that you are taking a very long time and we are under threat. So sometimes people do it themselves without waiting for the government to do anything. So these things happen.

They sometimes would deploy the snares or the traps, and there are situations where these animals get trapped into the snares and traps, very badly, and they get hurt very badly. So that is why we want to have a dialogue with the people and convince them that please don't do things like this. And sometimes accidentally these things happen because they actually the, the wild boar in India, it rates their crops and damages their crops at a very large scale.

So they put the traps or the fences or the wired. The wires, fences to prevent the wild boars, but these carnivores, when they are straying into those areas, they got trapped in these snares which are put for the wild boar. Then other things are capture and removal of the problem tigers.

Sometimes the manager, the wildlife, the PA manager, they take the decision that we have to capture, but capturing the problem tiger is also not very easy. Because it it not always solve the problem. In the free ranging tiger population, it's rarely possible to identify that particular individual who is.

In conflict, who is creating conflict. It's very difficult though we, when we have such cases, we deploy the camera traps, we on like the Deploy the people for tracking of the animal, but then in such a large forest area, it's very difficult to find that particular animal and capture that. Still, we try to do this and we have done this a number of times.

We match the stripes of the, because you know that the stripes of the tigers are unique to them. So by matching those stripes and we try to identify the individual and then we try to capture it. Furthermore, like say if chemical capture of the tigers is usually rendered difficult because of the crowd control problems.

This, this is also important because whenever we want to capture the problem animal from the area, the residential area, where it is creating the conflict, coming into the conflict, the people, they just gather around you. They're not bothered about their life. They don't think at all that this animal can harm them, but I don't know, due to curiosity or what, they'll not let you work properly.

They'll surround. They will all stand around you and because of that mob, it's more difficult. The mob control is more difficult than capturing the animal.

So we take help of the administration, we take help of the police department to control the crowd, and then we carry out such kind of rescue operations and Even after safe capture, the problem tiger has to be permanently housed in captivity or relocated in the source population from which it came, or into a new habitat. So what we say, what the wildlife scientists also say suggests that capturing and removing any carnivore, tiger, or leopard from any place is not a solution because you'll take that animal out, a space would be created. And it would be filled very quickly by some other animal.

So it's not a, and shifting is like a shifting of the problem. You are shifting that particular problem animal from one place to another, so it's like shifting the problem from one place to another. And if we talk about shifting to the rescue centres, so it is like life imprisonment for the animal and which is not a very good idea.

And we don't have like enough rescue centres also. If we want that every animal should be treated like this, every conflict animal should be captured and removed and shifted to the rescue centre, so we don't have so many rescue centres. Then some people use the barriers, some kind of guards, some kind of conditioning, like people use fences, like solar fences, wire mesh, nylon netting, wooden poles, all these kind of things are used to prevent.

The attacks of the trespassing of the animal. Then compensatory payment is one thing. Of course, nobody's life can be compensated with money, but still, the government have schemes to compensate for the livestock loss as well as the human life laws.

So the Family, the grieved family, they are given the compensation money and we tried that within 24 hours, at least first instalment of the compensation shall be given to the family. So this helps, but this is not A very good solution because in such situations, we have seen some unethical, immoral things as well. Like if someone, some family has a very senior citizen or seriously ill person or like say mentally retarded person, it's like I'm feeling very bad to say this, but When it's about money, so some people, they don't feel guilty in doing such things that they send those people, those kind of people, their family members, into the forest because they think that they're good for nothing and if they'll be killed by some carnivore, by a leopard or a tiger, then they'll get compensation.

So this is one drawback of this scheme. That people are thinking like this. And there is not always like a proper budget to sometimes there is a budget constraint.

A number of cases has happened, but we don't have the money according to the number of the cases. So sometimes these cases, they go pending and people, they are not happy about it. So there are problems in compensatory payments as well.

But yes, things are improving, systems are improving, things are digitalized now. So now the, it's better than before, but Of course, I cannot say that it 100% solves the problem. And there are relocation of the human settlements are being done for avoiding the conflicts because they are living inside the forest and animals are also inside the forest.

And because they cut the trees and they are some, they are disturbing the habitat, they are fragmenting the habitat. So the relocation schemes are also there. Though people don't want to do, they are not very happy about the scheme of government because these are people who have been living there in the forest inside the forest over the generations.

So what they say is that they don't know anything else to do. They are totally dependent on the forest and they are not interested to adopt any other kind of income generating activity or livelihood. They are happy living inside the forest and they don't.

They're not afraid of the animals. They have been living there. They're born and brought up there inside the forest.

So even if they have been allotted land outside, what they do is that they sell that land to other people and they still remain there inside the forest. So this is also a very difficult thing to do to convince them to relocate outside. And whenever like we go for the mitigation process.

So there is a stepwise process of anything when you do. So we have to first assess the risk. Risk assessment is important before you plan to do something.

So risk assessment is a process for gathering, assessing, and documenting information to assign a level of risk. What is the level of risk, then only? We can plan accordingly.

So first, we assess the risk. What is the hazard? We try to find out what is the hazard, which is called, due to which the, the this risk is there, and then we have to communicate the risk to the people that this much is the risk, this is the risk, and then evaluation is to be done.

And mitigation measures are to be taken accordingly. So when we talk of the risk assessment, then we, hazard exposure and context assessment is being done. Risk characterization is done in which the level of the risk is assigned to the event.

Then identification of the potential control measures as per the risk ranked by priority, taking into account the likelihood of success, and we have to see about how feasible this measure is which we are going to take. And we have to do all this exercise, this homework before going to do it actually. Then When you are doing something, of course you have to do the continuous monitoring and evaluation as the event unfolds, and the effective ongoing risk communication to ensure that risk managers, other stakeholders, and affected communities understand and support the control measures that are being implemented because, OK, we have decided to take some mitigation measures in the community.

To avoid, to prevent the conflict, but if the people are not convinced by those measures and they are not helping us, they will not participate, then we can never succeed in those carrying out those mitigation measures. So community is also very important. And then evaluation of the lessons learned at the end of the mitigation operation.

We have to review how the process went, what went well, what went wrong, what needs to be improved. So this kind of review at the last when the operation has ended is all to be, is also to be carried out. They, these are examples of some mitigation measures which we carry out like we do the situation analysis, we assess the type and magnitude of the conflict, and plan to address accordingly, seeking due permissions from the concerned authorities as we talk as I talked about the TLA warden.

Then we identify the hotspots of conflict. Because it's not that the conflict is widespread, there are some hotspots where the frequency of those incidents are more. So it's better that you identify the hotspots of conflict and focus on those areas.

Then estimation of conflict animal species, population around the conflict site, predation, or risk mapping can be done. And then assessment of the preparedness and resource availability because this is very important like you're going to do something but you don't have the resources or you are not prepared or your people are not skilled. They don't know what their role is, so you will fail, of course.

So these things are also very important. Skill development, capacity building of your team members, building exclusively exclusive team for that risk like a response team for that quick response team or primary response team rescue team, and then evaluation of the capacity and skills and then giving them the training as per their requirement. Identify the conflict causing wild animal, then track, monitor, and plan capture if required.

It's not that always you have to remove the animal. It's not that you always have to capture the animal. Sometimes you can just avoid, you sometimes you can just convince the people, you can tell them what to do and what not to do, to come into an accidental encounter, and health evaluation of the captured animal is also to be done because then only we can decide whether to release it or rehabilitate it.

And accordingly if release is planned, then first it's better that you do the radio collar. So just in case that animal gets into conflict again, so you know where the animal is moving. And if there are a requirement of recapture, so it would be easy for you if the animal is radio collared.

And these are some do's and don'ts which we try to tell people to avoid the conflict situations, like the ensure that your children are not alone in the dark hours in areas where leopards or tigers are present. If you have dogs, then make sure that they are in closed cages in the dark hours because dogs, they really attract leopards and tigers, the stray dogs or the pet dogs also. .

The livestock, it holds true for the livestock as well. They should also inside the shelter. They should not be, just, they should not move free at the dark hours.

Often dogs, they become attracted to garbage that is not properly disposed. Disposal of waste is also very important. There is one village, in our area.

They just dispose the carcass at one place. That is outside the village, but it's just near the forest. So they, disposed their livestock carcass at that one place.

So that is a very big attraction for the carnivores and a number of cases have happened because of those dumps, garbage dumps. So waste disposal is also very important. Then do not make a demand for trapping if an animal has not done anything.

It's not that you always have to remove the animal. And if you see a leopard or a tiger, do, do not threaten it. Don't go near it and just try to silently move away.

And this is one last slide which, I don't want to say anything about this, but I want everyone to think about it. That what is the solution do you think is for the conflict situation? What is the mitigation measure?

Either capture or coexistence? Because we have tried a number of captures. We have captured the animals.

We have shifted. To rescue centres. We have released them to different places, but when we release them, they have that homing instinct.

They come back to their places. We have seen that even they come back from 100, 150, 200 kilometres. They come back.

So, this is not a solution. Then if you shift them into the rescue centre, then you are giving them a life imprisonment, though they are, they don't have, there is no fault of them. Because it's us who are taking intruding into their habitat.

So I don't like that idea of giving the life imprisonment to them. So it's up to you whether you want to coexist or you want to remove that animal. It's all depends on your thinking.

So it's just for you food for thought for you. And thank you so much for listening to me. I just try to explain what the conditions are in India, what kind of positive and negative interactions are there, what measures we are taking, what kind of celebrations we are doing to, Create the awareness.

So thank you so much for listening. And if there are any questions, I would be happy to answer them. First of all, thank you, Bruce for agreeing to chair today and obviously a DT for the fabulous session.

I really enjoyed that. Obviously there are challenges with with everything in life, that the difficult if it was too easy, of course it . It wouldn't maybe be as much fun, but what I wanted to do today was talk a little bit about our, our vision for the future, but really to start off by talking a little bit about the virtual congress, this has been a very strange year for us all, you know, we, we kind of recognised coronavirus at the beginning of the year.

And when we ran the the Virtual Congress 2020, it was actually the first of February, and we were just beginning to be aware there were the first few cases coming into the UK. And obviously as vets who understand disease probably better than a lot of people, I think we all realised that potentially there was going to be a problem. We locked down early, we've obviously tried to support the profession as much as we can this year with helping BVA with the Coronavirus webinars.

With the mindfulness training that we offered for free during the, the first few months. And it's been really gratified to see, that I think we have been of assistance, you know, the webinar views have trebled this year, and I do sort of slightly with a jokey sense. Oh, I'm getting a bit of feedback.

Let me just see what's going on. Has somebody else got their mic still on? I have said jokingly that we have been preparing for the pandemic for the last 10 or 11 years, we just didn't realise at the time.

So I'm, I'm glad that we've been of assistance, but I wanted to talk a little bit about the virtual Congress and just give you some feedback from that as well. So it's been an incredible week of veterinary learning at the virtual Congress 2021. This is our ninth annual conference, so we started this in 2013 when virtual conferences weren't really a thing.

We've had over 35,000 veterinary professionals visiting the vet exhibition from 86 different countries, and there's been many thousands of hours of CPD viewed, and of course, this is available for 12 months. So there'll be much more opportunity for people to watch who've booked tickets, but perhaps haven't been able to watch it this week. And I think this is one of the advantages we've we've ended up doing.

About 30 different conferences, the World Veterinary Association conference in April, May last year. We also did the World Congress of Veterinary Dermatology in October, and we found that people have, have really appreciated that they could still continue to learn this year and also appreciating that. They don't need to choose, you know, a particular lecture to go to, between, you know, maybe the 2 or 3 auditorium that are opened because they can go back to them as and when they want to.

We also revealed our brand new virtual exhibition centre and I'd love to get feedback on that, how you found it. I think it's been really great going around the exhibition, looking at the goodie bag. MSD did a fabulous stand with some, webinars about tick-borne diseases, which if you haven't looked at yet, is well worth viewing.

And of course we've also had the the chat rooms, the video chat rooms, which have been used as well. And this exhibition will of course stay open, so please do go in and have a look around if you haven't had a chance to yet. When we started this, there, there really were no associations that got involved, and now we have so many that have been involved with us.

Obviously the World Veterinary Association, the WSAVA, the British Cattle Veterinary Association, NZVA, the New Zealand Veterinary Association, who we helped with the Congress as part of the World Veterinary Association Congress last April. And of course, BVA have always been Great supporters of the webinar vets, and of course we, we offered 6 hours free CPD on Friday for all of these associations, including the students, and on Saturday we we held a day for the students, as part of our Wiki vet commitment. We've just recently acquired Wiki Vett and are obviously hoping to to grow that and assist the students who I think are, having to find more material online with the, the closure of vet schools due to coronavirus.

Just some of the testimonials that we've had, I'm just getting a little bit of feedback, Bruce is somebody got the mic on. I'm just getting a little bit of feedback it's fine. I have registered twice on the on the list so I wonder if it's.

Yeah, I've actually muted that, so that should be should be all right. Yeah, I, I can't hear feedback. OK, that's great.

Anyway, that, that's all of the some of the feedback from, from people who've been at the presentation, so, really appreciate that. It's always nice to, to get some positive feedback on an event. So thank you for providing that and anybody else who'd like to send any feedback, obviously always welcome at Anthony at the webinar vet.com.

And as mentioned, we couldn't do this and make it so affordable for people to attend without the help of our sponsors, particularly our platinum sponsor MSD Animal Health, but I know also bought by many, which is an insurance company, that has been very supportive of vet nurses in the, in the profession this year. Just Breathe Easy, and obviously all of the other sponsors. Thank you so much for your help and support.

Just wanted to briefly finish by by talking about our theme at Webinar vet for this year, which is building a regenerative world. And of course, when I say webinar vet, you know, I also include our sister companies Wiki Vett, and of course, we also have Simply Vet, which is helping with veterinary recruitment as well. .

And, and then as I said, this year we've been doing a lot of virtual conferencing for, for different companies and associations for Royal Canon, for VAC, for, for the associations that I've already discussed. And the theme for this, for this year for us is building a regenerative world. You know, when I set up Webinar that in 2010, it was very much to make.

Veterinary education accessible and affordable to vets around the world. I also discovered that it was helping to reduce stress because people were able to get through their CPD a lot easier. When we set up webinar vet in 2010, there was no real online space.

And in fact, no, when I walked around the BSAVA conference in 2010, nobody even knew what a webinar was, so I, I brought that word into the dictionary. And, you know, particularly this year, it's been such a blessing to be able to help people to continue with their training, . Without having to go out to hotels or or to .

To conference centres to, to get their CPD. But I'm a real believer that this is an opportunity for us to reset, not only to sustain, but as Aditi has done in, in India, you know, to actually regenerate, the fact that we're seeing more tigers is a great thing. The fact that we know that that's linked to the environment as well, you know, if we cut all the trees down, if we poison all the rivers, we'll soon learn that you can't eat money.

As the native Indians have, have said before in America. So I think this is a real opportunity for us to reset when we get our freedom back, when we can travel again. Inevitably we will travel, but I think it's really important that we really consider how we can live lightly on the planet because.

The pandemic that we've seen is that partly due to some of our unsustainable ways of living, you know, the, the wildlife markets in China where animals are not treated well, where live and dead animals are mixed together, a planet that's also warming has all of these things made it much more likely for pandemics, and, you know, is this the first one, so. I, I do want to actually, you know, encourage people to, to think in a slightly different way, moving into the future. I just want to reshare again cause I know I've got a video coming up and I don't think I've pressed the, the button to share the sound, so I'll just do that now.

That's great. And Obviously, I founded the webinar that in 2010, and I've spent last year also trying to get up with my reading, and one of my favourite authors is David Attenborough, and he wrote last year a book called A Life on Our Planet, which, showed the time that he'd been alive, how the human population has grown, how forest cover has decreased, how the amount of carbon in the atmosphere has, has increased as well, but also showed us ways that we can actually, make things better. You know, I've been a, a, a ardent conservationist all my life.

I remember, when I was still at school, this was a book that was given to me. Or I bought, it's got my school in there, that was when I was in Saint Edward's in the 2nd year seniors, so I was about 13, and this really was a book that, really, I was already thinking about being a vet, but just. Really fell in love with all of the possibilities of, of the beauty of the world, a keen birdwatcher as well, and then when I was 18, his second book came out, The Living Planet.

It was a birthday present for my 18th from my sister, and, very kindly she'd managed to get it signed by David Attenborough. I don't know if you can see that there, so it's a treasured. Possession, he still continues to inspire us.

And in fact, it was only a day or two ago that he gave an address to the UN and I wanted to just share that video with you before I continue. If we continue on our current path. We will face the collapse of everything that gives us our security, food production, access to fresh water, habitable ambient temperature, and ocean food chain.

And if the natural world can no longer support the most basic of our needs, then much of the rest of civilization will quickly break down. Please make no mistake. Climate change is the biggest threat to security that modern humans have ever faced.

I don't envy you the responsibility that this places on all of you and your governments. Some of these threats will assuredly become reality within a few short years. Others could, in the lifetime of today's young people, destroy entire cities and societies, even altering the stability of the entire world.

Perhaps the most significant lesson brought by these last 12 months. Has been that we are no longer separate nations, each best served by looking after its own needs and security. We are a single, truly global species whose greatest threats are shared and whose security must ultimately come from acting together in the interest of us all.

I do believe that if we act fast enough, we can reach a new stable state. It will compel us to question our economic models and where we place value. Invent entirely new industries.

Recognise the moral responsibility that wealthy nations have to the rest of the world and put a value on nature that goes far beyond money. And through global cooperation, we may achieve far more than tackling climate change. We may finally create a stable, healthy world where resources are equally shared.

We may, for the first time. In the entire history of humanity, come to know what it feels like. To be secure.

I'm presuming Bruce, that you can still see the the picture there again, that that's come back. Yes, it's that's great. Wise words by David Attenborough, you know, I think that there is .

In his book, though, reasons to be optimistic as well, and I am an optimist. I think there are things that we can do, and it is within our grasp to do it. If we wait for governments, then we may wait a long time, they move slowly.

So I think as individuals and as companies, as businesses, which often, you know, most people here will will be involved in a business or or run a business. I think there are Real opportunities for us. So I, I, I, I'm definitely wanting to be positive, and I think if you haven't read the book A Life on our Planet, please do, because we can see how quickly nature can come round.

They were talking about David was talking about the nation state of Palau, and they've actually stopped fishing around the island and how quickly the fish have come back again, how quickly we can regenerate Costa Rica, . Decided a couple of decades ago to begin to reinforest the country, and it's one of the most beautiful and pleasant countries to live in. So there are some real opportunities for us, but we must grasp it now because we are reaching really difficult times.

This was a really interesting story from 2 or 3 years ago with Elon Musk actually creating virtual power plants from the sun. You know, we, we obviously are still oil based as a society, our economy is dependent on oil. We .

Make subsidies from from governments to make oil affordable, and of course every time we burn oil in our cars or in our houses or gas, then of course it has an effect on the, the greenhouse gases in our, in our atmosphere. And this happened in, in South Australia where they were able to build 50,000 houses with free solar panels and the Tesla batteries, the power wall, and they've actually been able to export energy back into the, the grid, and Australia is really struggling, or had been struggling to actually power itself with the high temperatures when people have all got their air conditioning on. The, the electricity can't actually, the, the grid can't take the demand and it crashes.

So this is something that we have every day, the sun shines even more so in Australia than in the UK. And I think we have So many possibilities if we use our ingenuity as a species, and I think this is something that we can do in all countries, not just in the really hot countries, but all of these techniques will actually help us to reduce our need to burn fossil fuels. What was really fascinating just before coronavirus really hit was that renewable energy was providing 47% of Britain's electricity from solar, from wind, wind particularly.

I, I live on the coast in Liverpool, and we have many, many wind turbines off the coast from us. So this is some of the good news that I think it's important for us to talk about, that there is hope. David Mags during the virtual congress has given some fabulous webinars, and I was lucky enough to be on a live webinar with him where he discussed feline herpes virus.

And if you want to learn a little tip, feline herpes virus more hyperemic chlamydia, more chemosis. If you haven't seen it, do go and have a look at that webinar. But David actually lives in.

In California, he, he, he works at the University College, Davis, and he's similarly just had a, an Elon Musk roof put on his house with the power wall, and on some days it obviously takes nothing from the grid, and on other days he's actually contributing to the grid. And Musk has made a solar panel that is actually a roof tile. So the actual roof becomes the, the solar panels as well.

So, really fortunate that we have brilliant men like Elon Musk who are taking these threats seriously and, and creating some fantastic technology for the future. I think it was really wise Aditi said, you know, yes, we can have all the technology, but we also have to learn that no man is an island. It's not all about me, it is about community, and I think one of the The gifts, if you like, that the pandemic has brought is that closeness that we've felt of, of coming out on our streets, getting to know our neighbours like we've not done before, and I think it is so important that we try and, Build on that community aspect, realising that it's not just about ourselves.

If, if people are suffering in other parts of the world, then, you know, we need to help them because also if we don't help them, then we have all sorts of refugee crises, so we should be wanting to create a better. Neighbourhood for ourselves, for our community, but also for the wider world. If we can start to think of our fellow humans in the world as, as brothers and sisters rather than as competitors, then I think the world will be a better place.

Of course, what we've tried to do is to build some really strong partnerships at Webinar vets. And we, we do monthly webinars withet Sustain. Laura Hyam is the founder and director of Vet Sustain, really encouraging practises to become more sustainable.

And we've done several webinars over the last year or two, and, and he's just some of them. A vet's Guide to Climate Change by David Ray, and then last January, February, you may remember as a harbinger of the pandemic, there were the terrible fires in Australia. Tanya Stevens is a vet over there and gave a very moving talk about that.

And then also, Caroline Grindrad and Marie Richardson and Joy Bruni gave an introduction to regenerative agriculture. You know, we as vets, I think can really lead in this area, because if we don't lead, we will be left behind, you know, we care about the animals, but I think we all know that this is all interrelated, that we must get, looking after the animals, the environment, and people are all really holistic and all part of the solution to the problem. So I would encourage you to look at some of those webinars as well.

We, we actually have, partnered, as I say, with, with Laura, to produce these, to make them widely available to the community, and they are free to attend. And then, through our relationship with them and also listening to April at a Spiffs conference, I think it might have been last year, it might have been the year before, but I think it was last year. We also, joined the Investors in the Environment scheme and were recently awarded a silver status.

I think partly because, again, although the mission was to make veterinary education accessible and affordable to vets and nurses across the world. I also very early on recognised how many miles we were taken off the roads and off the air by encouraging people to do the majority of their CPD online rather than travel long distances. So, you know, 1011 years ago before I set up Webinar vets.

If I wanted to do my training, often after an evening surgery, I would jump in the car, drive to Manchester 30, 40 miles away, do an hour of CPD and then drive home. Not only was I exhausted, I'd also used up precious resources, the planet maybe couldn't afford us to do. So.

We, we were really thrilled that we, we won, we got the silver accreditation from investors in the environment. And part of that, I think, was, was also that we'd lobbied our office block to actually change to renewable energy. You know, this is something that as that practises we can all do.

We can all put solar panels on our roofs as well. And I, I'm gonna try and encourage you to think of different ways that you can help, but certainly do. Listen to some of the webinars that April's done for us as well about climate change and about how we can make small differences, you know, as an individual, we can, go into despair thinking that there's nothing that we can do.

But actually, you know, the, the Greenpeace mantra is, act locally, but think, . Globally, and I think that's a really wise statement. So we, we shouldn't lose hope.

There are things we can do. The small things like changing to renewable energy can make a big difference if we all do it. He's also fascinated, to chat to Rob Jackson recently, who set up Vet offset, which is again partly done because he was travelling around, doing, you know, travelling a lot with his job.

Not only is he a vet, he's also a manager of, of the estates, and he's worked quite closely with the National Trust. And so because of his own travelling, he decided to go on a a drive of of actually planting trees. And he's planted many thousands of trees over the last couple of years.

And of course every tree that we plant is beginning to help with eating up the carbon that we know is increasing in the world's atmosphere. So, obviously, it's an opportunity for us all to offset our activities, our flights that we'll take in the future. It's, it's not a cure-all for everything, but I think it again recognises that when we take an action like jump in the car, you know, how many miles a year do we drive, when we take a flight to a conference or on holiday that we give back because, you know, we in the West are obviously using much more resource than somebody living in an Indian village.

So we have a big responsibility to give back for the benefit of the planet. Just, little things that we can do, some photographs here. I, I, I noticed that companies are becoming more, knowledgeable and more aware of the environment and more of what they have to do if they want to continue to, to, .

Do business with with people like ourselves who are becoming more environmentally aware. The the Business roundtable, a couple of years ago for the first time ever, said that the reason the company was set up was for protecting the, the environment, not just for making money for its shareholders. So, the view, which was a, a view from the 70s held by a famous economist called Milton Friedman, was that Actually, you know, the, the reason that business existed was to make money, make profit, and that was it.

And so they could do whatever they wanted. If they damaged the planet, if they created lots of plastic, if they cut all the trees down, it didn't matter as long as they were making money. And it was a real sea change when the Business roundtable group in America actually said, no, you know, we're, we're here.

To create a sustainable planet, to look after the environment, and many companies now are beginning to talk about environmental stewardship and governance and actually looking after their employees in a better way, and I think we can, we can all take small steps by, by using companies that actually, do that. So this coffee cup, we know that coffee cups, can create a huge problem. They've become a, a new form of waste.

And in fact, I have my own cup that I take around with me, but obviously during COVID, we're not allowed to, to give cups to the to the baristas. And so this small coffee shop in Crosby in the little town where I live, is actually using compostable lids, so they're not plastic lids that will just go into landfill. They can go into your green bins and be compostable.

Gillette always used to have it in the horrible plastic boxes. This was a cardboard box with a cardboard filler. And so again, small steps.

I've recently invested in a company called Aardvark that is providing, Insect-based pet food. So it means that we're not having to put lamb or chicken or beef in there. Obviously feeding our pets.

There is a carbon cost for doing that. Whereas if we can harvest our protein from insects. Then that will be much more sustainable.

So, you know, in the way that we invest, in the way that we buy products, let's try and buy products from in in a sustainable way with, with a sustainable mindset. Starting a sustainable practise, I, I think there are 5 steps. The first step is to have strong leadership, for the leadership to actually believe in it.

If this is just done for PR purposes, if it's just done as a sort of greenwashing exercise, then people will work that out. The next thing is, is to really get buy-in from the team, and I was so pleased that when we were chatting about this with the team just before Christmas, how many ideas the team were having about how we could become even more sustainable. This is not something that's, you know, a very small interest now.

Many, many people are beginning to see that we need to look after our planet better. Start small, you know, there are many small things we can do, like get our energy from renewable sources. And I think also to see that this is a way that we can actually save money as well.

You know, if we get an energy metre into our practise or into our home, we can probably see how we can save money by, Turning off the lights, turning off computers before we go home. All small ways, but they all contribute, and hey ho, they also save money. And then I would encourage people to think very seriously about accreditation with, you know, organisations like the investors in the environment as well.

Some of the suggestions, as I've already said, carbon offsetting, I think it's something that, if you are taking flights or, or driving a lot of miles, there are websites out there, obviously follow up on the vet sustained webinars to, to make you more educated in that area. Recycling, you know, that we do, separate and recycle appropriately. As I've said, obviously I, I am, have invested in in aardvark, somebody that I met at a conference, and I, I wanted to make a difference, so I put some money into something that I think is ethical and really encourages sustainability, so insect-derived protein for cats and dogs.

We had a great webinar by Zoe Havari, this week talking about sustainability in practise, and again, I would encourage you to look at that if you haven't. Nitrous oxide has a massive, massive effect as a greenhouse gas. There are now very good alternatives for analgesia.

We don't really need to use this gas anymore. We now know the damage that it does, so, you know, unless there's a really good reason we shouldn't be using it. I think also as vets, I, I've been .

Loved reading the rewilding book by Isabel Tree a couple of years ago, how we can actually look after the green spaces, how we can make them more biodiverse, you know, when we see a green field, and that's it, it's just a couple of types of grass, we don't see any wild flowers in it. We lose our pollinators, you know, the effect. Of losing pollinators mean that our crops don't grow as well.

There's many opportunities for us to also farm much more extensively, you know, to eat less meat, because we know that meat to actually convert. A kilogramme of meat from, from grain or grass takes a lot, and obviously if we're using grain, that's not as sustainable as just allowing a cow to eat grass. Of course it won't produce as much milk, but do we need it to produce as much milk?

Do cows that are supercharged to produce lots of milk actually live as long lives and are they, do they have as good welfare? These are all things I think that we have to question. Support local businesses and produce so that produce isn't coming from many miles away and that we try to eat in season.

I know we all like strawberries occasionally in the winter, but you know, can we think of eating in a more seasonal fashion? And then avoiding products that are excessively packaged, public transport or cycle if you can. And of course electric cars are becoming more popular now because of incentives from the government.

And in fact, I think in the last couple of months, about 1 in 5 cars that have been bought have been electric cars. So there's a lot of good things that are happening. I think it is important that we're optimistic, but we, we will only move forward if there are enough people of goodwill who really take this seriously, so.

I do hope that you've enjoyed the conference. I do hope you've enjoyed the fact that you've saved the miles that would have gone onto roads had we been able to travel for this. So thank you so much for doing that.

As part of our commitment to making this year a more regenerative year at the webinar that we're going to continue to work on becoming ever more sustainable. And we're actually making a commitment this year that every member, new member who joins the webinar vet, we will, plant two trees in their honour as well. So.

I do hope you've enjoyed the conference. Thank you so much for sticking with us and coming to these last couple of sessions. I love the DT session.

There's been many, many fabulous webinars this week. You've got 12 months to watch them. I hope you enjoy them.

I hope as part of our vision, they make you a better, more confident vet, a vet who still loves being a part of the profession. And not only does that, does such a good job that animal welfare improves, so that in the end, you know, animals are being better looked after and more loved. That's the reason I think we've all become vets and nurses, isn't it?

So thanks everyone for listening.