The Palmyrah Development Board (PDB) has made arrangements to initiate a scheme to plant palmyrah plants in a zig-zag style in order to prevent wild elephants and tuskers from entering villages at night; to impede the human-elephant (HE) conflict.
Accordingly, the Palmyrah Development Board(PDB) Kalpitiya Reginal Office has already handed over about 10,000 palmyrah seeds to the Wanatavilluwa Pradeshiya Sabha. This novel method would be an environment-friendly and natural way of protecting inhabited rural villages from wild elephants, as these elephants are presently destroying many crops, houses, and human lives in the Kurunegala and Puttalam districts of the North Western Province.
PDB District Manager S. Arul Seelan told the Daily News that seeds are bought from villagers at Rs. 5 each and grown to be used as a natural, protective fences to prevent wild elephants from entering villages.
This would be a long-lasting solution to the present HE conflict that claims 200 lives of wild elephants and 180 lives of humans, annually.
Add new comment