Kerala to issue new order to kill wild boars

Kerala government planned to issue a new conditional order allowing killing of wild boars due to increase in the cases of attacks by the animal on farmers in the forest fringe areas of the state.
Stating this in the assembly today, Forest Minister K Raju said during question hour that an order issued by the government to gun down wild boars in March 2013 had expired.
With increase in the instances of wild boar attacks, the government plans to come out with a new one to allow farmers to kill boars, Raju said adding no boar was killed under the previous order.

There were about 47,000 wild boars in the state as per a survey held three years ago, he said adding it was also planned to conduct a new census of wild boars.
Raju said that state has a total 16585 KM long forest boundary and out of this 13583 km has been surveyed and demarcated. The work of demarcating the remaining area was progressing, he said.
SMS alert system to warn people about wild animal attack in the forest fringe areas, now in force in Waynad and Munnar,would also be expanded, he said.

On steps taken to prevent the wild animals from straying into human habitation, he said solar fencing had been installed in 1500 km long area and constructed elephant trenches in about 584 km long stretch.

Besides this, granite walls also have been built in 34 km area to prevent elephant from entering residential areas.
An amount of Rs.25 crore has been sanctioned for projects to prevent wild elephant attack, he added.