In this episode of The Think Wildlife Podcast, host Anish Banerjee is joined by Divya Banerjee, founder of Uttarayan Wildlife, for a deeply grounded conversation on elephants, people, and landscapes in eastern India. Drawing on years of frontline conservation experience, Divya shares how elephant conservation in human-dominated regions is inseparable from social justice, livelihoods, and long-term ecosystem recovery.

The episode focuses on Asiatic elephants and the rapidly disappearing elephant corridors of southern West Bengal. These corridors once enabled seasonal movement between forests across Jharkhand, Odisha, and Bengal, but today they are heavily fragmented by deforestation, monocropping, and infrastructure expansion. As these wildlife corridors collapse, conflict escalates, placing immense pressure on both elephants and marginal farming communities. Divya explains why elephant corridor conservation is not simply about protecting space, but about restoring ecological functionality across entire landscapes.

A major theme of the conversation is ecosystem degradation and its cascading effects. Loss of forest cover, depletion of topsoil, water scarcity, and chemical-intensive agriculture have transformed once-diverse habitats into arid, unproductive land. Divya outlines how ecosystem restoration begins from the ground up, starting with soil regeneration, water retention, and the reintroduction of native plant species. These efforts are critical not only for Asiatic Elephant conservation but also for rebuilding biodiversity and ecological resilience.

The episode offers a rare, practical look at community-based conservation in action. Divya describes how local farmers are central to every stage of the work, from nursery management and plantation maintenance to alternative livelihoods such as vermicomposting and beekeeping. These initiatives strengthen local economies while supporting biodiversity conservation and biodiversity management, demonstrating that wildlife conservation is most effective when communities are genuine partners rather than passive stakeholders.

This conversation highlights the realities of conserving elephants outside protected areas, the challenges of restoring wildlife corridors in working landscapes, and the long-term commitment required to reverse ecosystem degradation. It is essential listening for anyone interested in elephant conservation, biodiversity conservation, ecosystem restoration, and people-centred approaches to conservation in India.

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