'Political short-sightedness fuelling human-elephant tragedy': Sajeewa Chamikara

Sri Lanka's worsening human-elephant conflict (HEC) one of the deadliest on the planet has reached what conservationists describe as a “national ecological emergency.”

- BY IFHAM NIZAM

Each year, more than 400 elephants and around 150 people perish in a spiral of violence that shows no sign of slowing. The numbers reflect not only a conservation crisis but also a profound failure of environmental governance.

For decades, successive governments have promised to “resolve” the conflict, yet the problem has only worsened. Wildlife experts and environmentalists now say that a lethal combination of political shortsightedness, unregulated land use, and chronic mismanagement has turned Sri Lanka's majestic elephants into refugees within their own home range.

Environmental activist Sajeewa Chamikara, of the Movement for Land and Agricultural Reform (MON-LAR), told The Island that Sri Lanka's HEC crisis has reached catastrophic proportions due to “decades of policy confusion and political interference in forest management.”

“The government has failed to understand that this is not an elephant problem — it’s a human management problem,” Chamikara said. “Politicians are fragmenting forests for short-term economic gain, allowing encroachments, and destroying elephant corridors.

Every time a forest patch is cleared for settlement or cultivation, elephants lose another lifeline.”

Ignored science and failed policies

The Human-Elephant Conflict Management Plan drafted as far back as 2011, with input from some of Sri Lanka's leading wildlife biologists, remains largely unimplemented.

Instead of a long-term, science-based approach, the state has relied on ad-hoc measures and reactive policies.

"Successive governments have ignored scientific strategies and promoted politically driven solutions such as arbitrary electric fencing. These fences were erected without ecological planning and in many cases cut right across elephant migratory routes," Chamikara explained.