Countering elephant raiding with Short Message Service: Challenges of deploying public participation-based systems in a setting with sparse Information Communication Technologies resources

摘要

Dwindling animal habitat and burgeoning human settlements have made managing human-animal conflict a critical problem in conservation of protected areas, particularly in the biodiversity-rich tropics. In this paper, we present a system aimed at leveraging public participation from affected communities to help effectively manage the conflict in both the short and long term. However, deploying a system that depends on volunteered information has its challenges in the unique settings of a national park where Information Communication Technologies infrastructure is sparse. The specific requirements of the system being easy to use and having automatic geocoding, coupled with the lack of internet access, made it impossible to deploy traditional crisis mapping software such as Ushahidi. We highlight the unique challenges of deploying a system that relies on volunteered information for managing human-animal conflict in a technology resource sparse environment and how the challenges were surpassed. Our system aims at streamlining the process of reporting cases of elephant raiding to the forest officials so as to elicit quick support. The long-term aim is to use the data collected through the system for spatio-temporal analysis to better understand elephant raiding patterns so that the parks services can be effectively deployed.