The Yala National Park is the most popular and well known of the protected areas in Sri Lanka. However, most residents of the surrounding communities do not have the means or the opportunity to ever visit the park. The local population and especially children have had no exposure to wildlife appreciation and have little knowledge of conservation. Consequently, their view of wildlife and especially elephants is in general negative.

Our research has shown that areas surrounding the park provide critical resources for wildlife, especially elephants. However whether any wildlife remains in this outside areas in the future depends entirely on the willingness of people living in the area to share the habitat with them. At present they do not derive any benefit from wildlife but incur many costs such as loss of crops and livestock, damage to property, personal injury, and sometimes even death caused by wild animals. Consequently they do not want to share their habitat with wild animals.

In collaboration with the Department of Wildlife Conservation, we are currently developing projects to provide the local people with benefits from conservation. One of the long term activities we are conducting in this regard is community outreach and participation in conservation. The program for school children, which fosters conservation awareness by providing opportunities to visit and observe wildlife in the National Park, and relate to conservation in a positive way, is a key activity in this regard.

We have been conducting the schools program from 2000 to 2001 in schools around Yala National park. Our activities include lectures, discussions, slide shows and films that introduce school kids to wildlife appreciation and conservation, art and assay competitions that increase environmental awareness, workshops introducing them to bird watching, and field trips to Yala and Uda Walawe.

We are looking for funds to continue this program in the years to come.

Collaborators

Department of Wildlife Conservation, Sri Lanka
www.dwlc.lk

Lecture-discussion at the
Yoda Kandiya school close to Yala

School children on trip to the National Park

Video presentation at a Sunday school