Union Minister Bhupender Yadav Presided Wildlife Week 2025 Celebrations & Launched Key Initiatives

In October 2025, Union Minister Bhupender Yadav, Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change (MoEF&CC) presided over the 71st National Wildlife Week – October 2 to 8 (WLW 2025) celebrations held at Hari Singh Auditorium, Indira Gandhi National Forest Academy (IGFNA), Forest Research Institute (FRI) Campus in Dehradun, Uttarakhand.

• During the event, the Union Minister launched 5 national projects aimed at strengthening species conservation and addressing human wildlife conflict.
• He also unveiled 4 national-level action plans & field guides for species population assessments and monitoring programmes.

About Wildlife Week 2025:

WLW 2025 Theme: ‘Human-Wildlife Coexistence’, aimed to gather community support which will help in moving from ‘conflict to coexistence’.

Hosts: The event was organised by MoEFCC in partnership with the Wildlife Institute of India (WII), Indian Council of Forestry Research and Education (ICFRE), IGFNA and FRI.

5 National Projects for Species Conservation & Conflict Management:

Project Dolphin (Phase-II): This project is designed to strengthen conservation measures for river and marine cetaceans across India.

• The action plan outlines key focus areas: training, technology and community participation to mitigate accidental dolphin deaths and restore river habitats.
• The second phase of the project aims at capacity-building for the rescue and rehabilitation of dolphins, promoting community networks among fishermen and citizens, preventing net entanglement and assessing the impact of river infrastructure projects on dolphin habitats.
• The first population estimation of river dolphins in India conducted from 2021 to 2023, had revealed the presence of 6,327 dolphins in the Ganga, Brahmaputra and Indus River systems.

Project Sloth Bear: It includes the launch of the national-level implementation framework for the conservation of Sloth Bear and release of the project brochure.

• The project, running from October 2025 to October 2030, is being led by WII and implemented by 16 state forest departments.
• The project mainly focuses on mapping conflict hotspots, monitoring populations and restoring degraded habitats to bolster corridor connectivity.
• Sloth bears are listed as “vulnerable” by the (International Union for Conservation of Nature) IUCN and found across 20 Indian states and account for about 90 per cent of the global population.

Project Gharial: It also includes the launch of the implementation action plan for the conservation of Gharials and release of the project brochure.

• The project covers key rivers such as the Chambal, Ramganga, Girwa, Ghaghara, Gandak, Mahanadi, Son and Ken, spread across Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Odisha and Assam.

CoE-HWC at SACON: A Centre of Excellence-Human Wildlife Conflict Management (CoE-HWC) established at  Salim Ali Centre for Ornithology and Natural History (SACON). This new dedicated national centre aims to support policy, research, and field-based mitigation of human-wildlife conflicts in India.

• This new CoE focuses on 6 key areas such as: policy and advocacy, spatial analysis, technology integration, stakeholder engagement, capacity building and long-term research.
• In order to develop technology-based solutions, the centre will collaborate with Bhaskaracharya National Institute for Space Applications and Geo-Informatics (BISAG-N), under the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) and Indian Institute of Technology-Madras (IIT-M).

Tigers Outside Tiger Reserve (TOTR): This newly launched initiative aims to redress conflicts outside protected areas using a landscape approach, technological interventions, capacity building & community support.

• The phase-I of the project will cover 40 forest divisions across 09 states, with National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) as the coordinating agency and state forest departments implementing measures on the ground-level.
• Key activities like: rapid response teams equipped with rescue gear, deployment of drones and Artificial Intelligence (AI)-based monitoring tools and tracking of tiger movements using camera traps, M-STrIPES system among others, will be taken under this project.
• India is home to about 70 per cent of the world’s wild tiger population and the country’s tiger numbers have risen from 1,411 in 2006 to 3,682 in 2022, with nearly 1,325 tigers estimated to be outside reserves.

4 National-Level Actions for Species Population Estimation:

Second Cycle of River Dolphin and Cetacean Estimation: It includes the release of the brochure and field guide.

All India Tiger Estimation Cycle-6: It includes the release of field guides in 8 regional languages.

Action Plan for the Second Cycle of Snow Leopard Population Estimation.

Progress Report on the Population Estimation of Great Indian Bustard and Lesser Florican.

Other Key Highlights:

Inauguration of SFS Officers’ Mess: Union Minister virtually inaugurated the SFS Officers’ Mess at Central Academy for State Forest Service (CASFoS) in Coimbatore, Tamil Nadu (TN).

Conclusion of National Hackathon on HWC Co-existence: The hackathon witnessed the participation of 420 young innovators from 75 institutions across 20 States and Union Territories (UTs).

• The 3 week-long hackathon showcased Artificial Intelligence (AI)-based tools, spatial analytics, and community engagement models for real-time conflict mitigation.
• On the concluding day of hackathon, 6 finalist teams presented their innovations before the Union Minister and an expert jury.
• Also, top 3 winners received cash prizes and certificates while other runner-ups were felicitated with appreciation prizes.

IGFNA Wildlife Quiz Winners: Additionally, Union Minister Yadav presented awards to the winners of the IGFNA wildlife quiz competition.
About Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change (MoEFCC):
Union Minister- Bhupendra Yadav (Constituency- Alwar, Rajasthan)
Minister of State (MoS)- Kirtivardhan Singh (Constituency- Gonda, Uttar Pradesh, UP)