Indo-French Partnership on Kaziranga Project

In Context

• Some measures at the Kaziranga National Park in Assam will form the cornerstone of an Indo-French initiative.

Measures

• With French and Indian technical and financial support, the Indo-Pacific Parks Partnership will facilitate partnership activities for interesting natural parks of the Indo-Pacific region. 
• These activities include biodiversity conservation, wildlife management and engagement with local communities.

About The Kaziranga project,

• The Kaziranga project is a part of a larger Assam Project on Forest and Biodiversity Conservation (APFBC) for which the Agence Française de Développement (AFD) has committed funding of €80.2 million for a 10-year period, between 2014-2024. 
• The project conceptualised the reforestation of 33,500 hectares of land and the training of 10,000 community members in alternate livelihoods by 2024.
  •  Kaziranga National Park that remains the heart of the programme.

• The AFD programme has been most effective in the skilling of communities in the area, particularly forest-dwelling communities.
  • The Assam government has now begun a massive reforestation drive with the help of the AFD.
  • The project has also developed infrared-based early warning systems, triggered by elephant footfall, to either scare off herds from human habitat or to warn villagers.

Kaziranga National Park

• It is the largest undivided representative area of Brahmaputra valley floodplain grassland, a complex ecosystem of grassland, where various stages of biotic succession in the grassland ecosystem are explicit.
• The Park is the abode of more than 70% of One Horned Rhinoceros in the world.
• It is one of the oldest wildlife conservancy reserves of India, first notified in 1905 and constituted as a Reserved Forest in 1908.
• It was declared a Wildlife Sanctuary in 1950, and notified as Kaziranga National Park in 1974 under the Wildlife (Protection) Act, of 1972.
• It  was declared a World Heritage Site back in 1985. It is recognized as an Important Bird Area by BirdLife International.

Source: IE