Skip to main content

Technology mediator for Human-wildlife conflicts in Lhuentse


Repellent installed in paddy field

Often the battleground for the vicious warfare between man and beast is crop-laden field of the farmer. Both venture into the war zone with no viable option at their disposal. On one side of the balance, the dwindling forests cover with not much of stuff to fill their yearning stomach, the wild animals sneak into the green field to steal their fill. On the other, a farmer has invested his own share of energy in the quest of securing a ration for his family for the year. He witnesses it go down the drain when a pack of wild animal pays a surprise and uninvited visit to his field one fateful night. At loss and burning with vengeance, he hunts down the culprit. But this doesn’t prove to be anything useful to put an end to the clashes. This battle if not done something is here to keep wagging for time immemorial.
On the comforting side, there is some solace with the fact that different stakeholders under Ministry of Agriculture and Forests is exploring all possible remedies and leaving no stone unturned. Every strategy is being tried out one such thing is the technology called “Sound Repellent Unit“. The recent concerted effort is initiated in Lhuentse by National Post Harvest Centre, Paro in collaboration with Dzongkhag Administration. Though it is not cent percent solution to nagging problem, it is expected to control and manage wild animal problems to certain extend.
The unit comes in a very compact, safe, power efficient, effective and environmentally-friendly pest repellent form. It is easy to operate in field pocket where the probabilities of attacking the standing field crop are deemed high. In current batch, 12 sound repellent units were installed at Jarray geog, 7 at Kurtoe, 5 at Tshenkar and another 5 at Gangzur. Although it is premature for beneficiaries to assess its implication, few beneficiaries illustrate that, “sound produced in a gap of 3 to 5 minutes along with bright light terrifies the wild pest. This has helped minimize crop damages by Monkeys, wild boar, porcupines, deer and bears”.  Currently, farmers are quite optimistic that their crop stands safe form wild pest damages and will be able to harvest it productively.
Installation of sound unit in aforementioned geog encourages the community to intensify agriculture activities. This is because with the device taking care, the labour requirements for guarding the field have been halved.  Dzongkhag agriculture sector has proposed few more sound repellents to allocate the same in other four geogs.
The installation of sound repellent in affected areas is likely to help augment the annual yield from the farmer’s field by losing less to wildlife depredation. Such move will also contribute in reducing poverty of farmers thereby making food available and make the family self sufficient. Therefore, agriculture sector would like to extend our amiable gratitude to National Post Harvest Centre on behalf of farmers for supplying sound repellent whereby they enjoyed the light of technology which was experiencing for the first time. Such technology is going to be proved as recess to farmers. They’ve always looked forward for such intervention from the government. Hence, we expect similar kind of support in near future as to improve the livelihood of rural people.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Love for a Days’s Trip

‘To meet, to know, to love and to depart is the law of life’ someone has said it. We rally with strangers and people we have never known before in homes, schools, institutions and other public gatherings because we are born in different places. When we meet the strangers, we make friends with some of them and sometime we fall in love with few of them especially the young guys and ladies. We remains committed and dedicated to friendship or loveship, whatever the relationship you are sharing. But for how long? You got to ask yourself. One fateful day, you find that you are departing from your friend or lover going away to find your own friend, your own lover and your own foes. Ofcourse, it hurts so much but it is a law the life has framed and you ought to obey it. And if you don’t keep in contact through all possible means, it is much easier to forget. While traveling in the bus, you share the seats with someone especially with spinsters and you introduce, talk and become friend and s
Post a Comment
Read more

A Long, long, long journey to Education

“Root of the education is bitter but the fruit is sweet” no one would know about it better than Kado. The fatigue of having to toddle to the school, fever of unending exams, the torture of having to burn the midnight oil, dozing in classes and the stern rigors are hard to endure, few even give up on the way but many endure it with utmost determination and commitment, because deep inside everyone knows it pays later. “Root of the education is bitter but the fruit is sweet” no one would know about it better than Kado Kado in the tender age of 12 is negotiating the lazily meandering footpath along the steep mountain. His school bag, full of books, pulls him back. His black naughty boy school shoe is all soiled, indication of how many times he has trudged that same footpath. He is on his way to the primary school in his village, almost 5 kilometers away. He has to make sure he is in the school before morning social work starts; else he gets penalized. Unlike the students who reside nearb
Post a Comment
Read more

Defining Tsa-Wa-Sum in One’s own Perspective

If I am asked, I would boldly answer, “The Tsa-Wa-Sum is “Gyeb, Gyelkhab and Meser”, (King, Country and People). But not everyone knows about what tsa-wa-sum is. Hence, when the superior ask them, they are left to conceive their own tsa-wa-sum. Once a meeting was convened by the Dzongdag. In a large congregation of illiterate rural people, the Dzongdag thundered, “do you know what tsa-wa-sum is?” “Can anyone from the crowd tell me?” The crowd went to pin drop silence and no one seems ready to answer. Are they scared of Dasho or no one has the slightest idea what it is? Suddenly, a Ngalop man sitting in the last bench, for whom Dasho is hardly visible, stood up. With his head bowed low, he answers, “The three tsa-wa-sum are Ngalops, Sharchops and Lhotsampas”. “This is because they are the three race in Bhutan” Dasho went into bout of annoyance but before he fired the man, another Lhotsampa (Southern Bhutanese Man) supplemented, “the three tsa-wa-sum are Royal Bhutan Army (RBA) Royal B
1 comment
Read more