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Indian Tiger Tourism Is Legal Again, But Tigers Are Still Disappearing

After banning tourists from tiger reserves in July, India's Supreme Court has now reversed course, once again allowing India's lucrative tiger tourism business back into preserves. The tourism industry and conservationists are both hailing the...

After banning tourists from tiger reserves in July, India’s Supreme Court has now reversed course, once again allowing India’s lucrative tiger tourism business back into preserves. The tourism industry and conservationists are both hailing the canceling of the ban, but they also raise a good point: Why was it instated in the first place?

India is home to about half of the world’s 3,200 remaining wild tigers. That’s a far cry from the around 30,000 tigers that lived in the country a century ago; that number dipped to around 4,000 in the 70s, and has dipped lower ever since largely due to poaching. With India’s tigers severely threatened, it appears that the Supreme Court’s 12 week ban was aimed at forcing states to comply with national guidelines on protecting tigers.

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In July, the court said that a number of states weren’t complying with the guidelines, and banned tourism from the tiger-breeding areas of 41 preserves. The court’s reversal allows tourism in the outer 20 percent of those parks, and comes with the stipulation that states have six months to present plans for complying with the national guidelines. Also, because the Supreme Court was concerned with the potential construction of massive, high-impact resorts popping up, it has place a moratorium on new tourist facilities

Agencies in the tiger tourism industry isn’t all created equal. Tourism in general can help pumped need cash into local economies, and is definitely key for raising awareness of conservation efforts. But poorly-run attractions can be destructive to the local environment, and the industry has been plagued by illegal operations. But at the end of the day, poaching is the biggest threat to tigers, not tourists.

"This is a big relief for us in the tourism industry because India is one of the few countries where you have a good chance of seeing the tiger in the wild," Subhash Goyal, president of the Indian Association of Tour Operators, told the Washington Post. "Since the ban, we have been witnessing a significant fall in bookings. Tourists are not enemies of tigers. It is in the tourism industry's interest to protect the tiger."

Conservationists agree, saying that the tourism industry, and the money it brings, offers more chance at protecting forests and keeping out poachers than if reserves were left all alone. It’s a pragmatic argument to be sure, but it’s realistic. Still, that doesn’t mean that reserves should be left wide open to tourist operations, as some have written while willingly ignoring research. Limiting tourism to the outer edges of preserves, and keeping their interiors as pristine as possible, is extremely important to the overal health of the tiger population. That exposed edges of a habitat are generally of lower quality than those in the center is a basic tenet of ecology, and opening up preserves to criss-crossing safari roads and tourists is a surefire way to degrade tiger habitats, which is a valid long-term threat.

But in the near term, poaching is still the biggest threat to tigers. So far this year, 52 tigers have died in India, many due to poaching, and there have been 12 seizures of tiger parts. The number of seizures has already surpassed 2011’s total, and the number of tiger deaths is close. India is home to most of the world’s tigers, but they’re being killed and smuggled to be used as bribes in Vietnam and as erection pills in China. So while regulating the tourism industry in India is key to protecting tigers’ future, they won’t have one if a solution to the poaching crisis isn’t found soon.

Image via the Corbett Foundation

Follow Derek Mead on Twitter: @derektmead.