Thumbs-up from a marine conservation perspective
The Wildlife Action Plan must be implemented to alter the historical attitudes towards marine ecosystems
Across the world, the history of marine regulation is traced to approaches and worldviews emerging from terrestrial domains. In India, the protection of marine ‘wildlife’ and spaces which are protected is mainly through the creation of marine protected areas under the various categories of the Wild Life Protection Act, 1972 (WLPA), or by categorising various species on the protected species lists or ‘schedules’ of the WLPA. Nearly half a century of WLPA-style protection has passed, but few can claim that marine habitats and species have been well-served by this legislation and its approaches to conservation.
Marine conservation perspectives have always been on the margins of the conservation narrative. The new National Wildlife Action Plan (NWAP), in an attempt to change that, suggests some bold steps towards new and inclusive approaches. But how these suggestions are implemented will depend on changing many of the historical attitudes of wildlife conservationists, the forest department, development planners, and the legal edifice of the WLPA.
A major shortcoming is the inability to perceive marine wildlife as a resource that can be sustainably harvested. This approach is in stark contrast to the perspectives of coastal communities and fisheries, bringing the four million fisherfolk who depend on these resources in direct conflict with the WLPA.
The NWAP’s call for greater coordination with the ministry of agriculture indicates that there is recognition of the problem. But the proposed action (that calls for immediate amendments to the fisheries laws rather than broadening the scope of the WLPA itself) indicates a hesitancy to reflect upon the limitations of the WLPA.
Today, a multiplicity of departments are in charge of coastal and marine regions such as the Forest Department, Coast Guard, Fisheries Department, Public Works Department, Port Authorities, Marine Police, Customs Department to name a few. With the entry of large infrastructure, oil and gas, and largescale tourism into the coastal space, an autopsy of laws like the CRZ (or the WLPA) are instructive to policy reform. How else can one understand how contemporary coastal India, once the domain of multiple maritime traditions and livelihoods has become a contested space marked by large industrial infrastructure on the one hand and impoverished ecologies and communities on the other?
The novelty of the ‘new NWAP’ will be felt only if it makes the slightest dent to the legal edifice of the WLPA and its historical attitude to people and their fluid relations with wildlife and that of the state to development.