Price tag set for tiger conservation... wow that a lot of money

Price tag set for tiger conservation

The cost of keeping tigers alive in the wild has been estimated at about $80m (£50m) per year, according to a study by conservationists - but only about $50m (£30m) per year is being pledged by charities and groups aimed at saving the tiger.


This vast amount of money reminds me of a comment made by Springwatch / big cat diary star and photographer Chris Packham who earlier this year in May stated donating money to tiger conservation ¬charities is a waste of time.


His comments came less than a year after he said endangered pandas should be left to die out. In an interview with the Radio Times, Packham blasted environmentalists working to save them.“Tiger conservation is a multimillion-pound business that isn’t working,” the 49-year-old said.“If it were in the FTSE 100, it would have gone bankrupt. I’m not saying the conservation agencies don’t have their hearts in the right place, but the results are disastrous.”


I think Chris was mis-interpretated as is always the case with the media and something I myself have been the victim of in the past, over exuberant, sensationalist hyperbole reporting.


Chris’s comments actually hold true but in the sense that the charities for all their efforts would fail if they were a normal business. Is the money that we are all donating actually helping get to the crux of the problem? Sadly at present it seems Tigers are worth more dead than alive and this is all down to poaching and the need for dead tigers from china for their supposed herbal medicine!!


I think for all the critics Chris was actually trying to say Tiger conservation results over the past 10-20 years are disastrous. For those that have watched him on TV or read his blogs he is a very keen environmentalist and loves the natural world and its creatures around us. As stated earlier I feel it was reporter sensationalism.


So just what is the price of saving the Tiger? The St Petersburg Summit in November will no doubt have something to say...... lets hope that finally there is a united voice to help save this most beautiful of big cats.


For more on the price on tiger conservation please see the link from BBC below.


http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-11304611


For more on Chris Packhams interview please see this link to the Telegraph


http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/earthnews/7760147/Tiger-conservation-is-disastrous-says-BBC-wildlife-presenter-Chris-Packham.html

Continuing the Save the Tiger theme on MrShutterbug Wildlife Photography

This 1 minute tiger advertisement was created by WWF office in the US to promote the fact that we can double the number of tigers by the next year of the tiger in 2022.

MrShutterbug Wildlife Photography Tiger Calendar 2011

Finally got round to working on my calendars for 2011

first up the 2011 MrShutterbug Wildlife Photography Tiger calendar.

Its seems the tiger holds a place not just in my heart but all the fans.

Any purchase goes to helping these magnificent cats, just click on the following link

http://www.redbubble.com/people/mrshutterbug/calendars/6049533-4-mrshutterbug-wildlife-photography-tigers-2011

As always let me know your comments and enjoy

All the best

MrShutterbug



Save the Tiger

Many MrShutterbug Fans know that one of my favourite cats to photo is the majestic tiger.

However the tiger’s plight is being highlighted on an almost daily basis at present.

It is no coincidence that recently the BBC had a 3 part special on building a tiger corridor through Bhutan and the lower Himalayas to help link up isolated pockets of this most beautiful endangered cat.

A Summit is taking place in St Petersburg in Russia to highlight the Tigers plight on November 21st and will be hosted by Vladimir Putin.

Prime ministers and wildlife experts from across the world will travel to Russia's second city of St. Petersburg to discuss urgent steps to be taken to preserve the tiger population during the Tiger Summit.

At the end of the 20^th century there were an estimated 100,000 wild tigers across Asia and the Russian Far East. Poaching, illegal trade, and habitat loss have steadily pushed tigers to the verge of extinction. Today, there are perhaps 3,500 wild tigers living in their natural habitat in tiger range countries - Bangladesh, Bhutan, Cambodia, China, India, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Nepal, Russia, Thailand, and Vietnam.

Poaching for fur and destruction of habitat have been major causes of the extinction of tigers. Russia is striving to protect and recover its own Amur tiger population. The Russian Far East is the home to the Amur (or Siberian) tiger, the biggest cat species in the world, which inhabits the temperate taiga forest near the country's border with China.

Tigers in Russia have experienced a significant decline recently, after a recovery from less than 30 individuals in the late 1940s to almost 500 animals in 2005

How can these world leaders help?

What is new is the scale of money being discussed, in some cases billions of dollars over the next twenty years, this has all been supported by a programme headed up by World Bank President Robert Zoellick. This is welcome, as for too long conservation has been forced to operate on the cheap, with budgets that would be laughable in most other sectors. But all resources will need to be pulled together and tougher action will need to be taken against the poachers and makers of Chinese medicine. Perhaps the Chinese Government would like to get involved???
Lessons need to be learned from the reintroduction of the Rhino in Kenya.

Somehow we have to make this Year of the Tiger different. The Global Tiger Initiative is helping to do this along with leading naturalists like Doctor Alan Rabinowitz, the World Bank and several partners, including GEF, the Smithsonian Institution, Save the Tiger Fund, and International Tiger Coalition and World Wildlife foundation to try and achieve one aim. Its overarching goal is to reverse the precipitous decline of tigers in the wild and to double their numbers by 2022.

I wish them luck and hope the politicians listen and react in a positive manner as I for one would had to see the extinction of what can only be described as one of the most magnificent and powerful animals on the planet.

If you would like to do your bit then please sign the petition at

https://support.wwf.org.uk/tiger_campaign/