Yahoo News 20 Oct 10;
MOSCOW (AFP) – Nature conservation body WWF on Wednesday said key tiger habitats in Russia's Far East were slated for logging in what would be a new blow to the dwindling population of the highly endangered Amur tiger.
Next week the local government in Primorsky region is planning to auction off some 28,000 cubic metres (990,000 cubic feet) of forest which includes cedar and oak forest inhabited by the Amur tiger, said Denis Smirnov, head of forest programme at WWF Russia's Amur Branch.
"Essentially these are the key habitat areas for the Amur tiger," Smirnov told AFP by phone from the regional capital Vladivostok.
"That is being done under the guise of improvement felling," he said, referring to the cutting down of damaged or old trees. Once a tree felling permit is obtained, it will be next to impossible to control how much timber will be cut, he said.
The timber parcels slated for logging October 26 include forestland in a future nature reserve that contains a cross-border habitat corridor between Russia and China.
Betweeen 400 and 500 tigers remain in the wild in Russia, and a further 20 to 25 live in China. Degradation of the animal's habitat and poaching of the tiger and its prey are blamed for its rapid disappearance.
Prime Minister Vladimir Putin in the past years has made a big show of his love for nature, publicly kissing animals and engaging in a string of stunts involving wildlife including tigers, leopards, bears and whales.
Late next month Russia is scheduled to host a tiger summit in Saint Petersburg expected to be attended by Putin.
Tigers could be extinct within 12 years: WWF
Yahoo News 21 Oct 10;
STOCKHOLM (AFP) – Tigers could become extinct within 12 years but a top level meeting in Russia next month could help reverse the decline, nature conservation body WWF said on Thursday.
"The worse scenario is that the tiger could be gone when the next year of the tiger comes along, in 12 years," said Ola Jennersten, head of the international nature conservation programme at WWF Sweden.
The organisation is leading a global campaign to attempt to double the number of tigers by 2022, when the next Chinese calendar year of the tiger comes around.
WWF said that in the last century, illegal hunting, a shrinking habitat and the trade of tiger parts used in oriental medicine had sent the number of the big cats worldwide plunging 97 percent to around just 3,200 tigers today.
"Despite the gloomy figures, the situation is more hopeful than ever," Jennersten said, praising a political initiative of 13 'tiger states' and different bodies set to meet in Russia on November 21-24 in a bid to halt possible extinction of the species.
"This will be achieved through increased political involvement, focus on the tiger landscapes that have the greatest chance of long term retention of the tiger, and increased control of tiger trade," he said.
Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, who in the past years has made a big show of his love for nature, publicly kissing animals and engaging in a string of stunts involving wildlife including tigers, is expected to attend the summit in Saint Petersburg.
WWF said some 1,800 tigers live in India, Nepal, Bhutan and Bangladesh, 450 live in Sumatra, 400 in Malaysia, 350 are spread throughout southeast Asia and around 450 live in the wild in Russia.
