The Union Cabinet has approved the creation of the International Big Cat Alliance, with its headquarters in India, to establish a global network for conserving tigers and other big cats.

It also approved a one-time budgetary support of Rs 150 crore for the multi-country, multi-agency coalition of 96 big cat range countries for a period of five years from 2023-24 to 2027-28.

International Big Cat Alliance (IBCA)

• Prime Minister Narendra Modi launched the International Big Cat Alliance (IBCA) in Mysuru on April 9, 2023 at an event commemorating 50 years of Project Tiger in India.

• It aims to create a global movement for enhancing the conservation of seven big cat species — tiger, lion, leopard, snow leopard, cheetah, jaguar, and puma.

Out of the seven big cats, five — tiger, lion, leopard, snow leopard, and cheetah — are found in India.

• IBCA will strengthen global cooperation and mobilise financial and technical resources to support the entire ecosystem associated with the conservation of these species and their habitats. 

• It will serve as an evolving platform for convergence of knowledge and best practices, supporting existing specific inter-governmental platforms, while also providing direct support to recovery efforts in potential range habitats.

• The governance structure of the IBCA consists of an Assembly of Members, a Standing Committee, and a Secretariat headquartered in India. 

• The Framework of Agreement (statute) has been drafted largely on the pattern of the International Solar Alliance (ISA) and will be finalised by the International Steering Committee (ISC).

• The Steering Committee will be constituted with nominated national focal points from founding member countries. 

• The Director-General will be appointed by the environment ministry as the interim head of the IBCA Secretariat until IBCA appoints its own DG during the assembly meeting.

• The IBCA Assembly at the ministerial level will be chaired by the Union environment minister. 

• IBCA would have a multi-pronged approach in broad-basing and establishing linkages in several areas and help in knowledge-sharing, capacity-building, networking, advocacy, finance, and resource support.

• With big cats as mascots for sustainable development and livelihood security, India and the countries within the big cat range can initiate significant efforts toward environmental resilience and climate change mitigation.

• This will pave the way for a future where natural ecosystems continue to thrive and gain centrality in economic and development policies.

• By safeguarding big cats and their habitats, the IBCA contributes to natural climate adaptation, water and food security and well-being of thousands of communities reliant on these ecosystems.

Project Tiger

• In 1973, the Project Tiger was established with the objective of utilising the tiger’s functional role and charisma to garner public support and resources for preserving representative ecosystems. 

• Project Tiger is an ongoing centrally sponsored scheme of the ministry of environment, forests and climate change providing central assistance to the tiger states for tiger conservation in designated tiger reserves.

• Since its inception, the project has expanded from nine tiger reserves covering 18,278 square kilometres (sqkm) to 54 reserves in 18 tiger range states.

• The tiger reserves are constituted on a core/buffer strategy. The core areas have the legal status of a national park or a sanctuary, whereas the buffer or peripheral areas are a mix of forest and non-forest land, managed as a multiple use area.

• Most tiger reserves and protected areas in India are existing as small islands in a vast sea of ecologically unsustainable land use, and many tiger populations are confined to small protected areas. Although some habitat corridors exist that allow tiger movement between them, most of these habitats are not protected areas, continue to deteriorate further due to unsustainable human use and developmental projects, and thereby are not conducive to animal movement.

• Project Tiger aims to foster an exclusive tiger agenda in the core areas of tiger reserves, with an inclusive people oriented agenda in the buffer.

• The conservation of tigers in India can be divided into two phases. The first phase starting in the 1970s, involved the enactment of the Wildlife Protection Act and the establishment of protected areas that helped conserve tigers and tropical forest ecosystems.

• However, in the 1980s, the trade in tiger parts began to decimate the population, leading to a shocking revelation of local extinction of Tigers in the Sariska Tiger Reserve in 2005 and thus began the second phase. 

• The second phase began in 2005-06, with the government adopting a landscape-level approach and implementing strict monitoring for tiger conservation. 

• India has become home to approximately 75 per cent of the world’s tiger population.

• The number of tigers in India has increased from 2,967 in 2018 to 3,682 in 2022, an annual rise of 6 per cent.

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