After decades of relentless hunting, tiger (Panthera tigris) populations have timidly begun to recover. Credit goes to effective conservation projects such as Tx2, a project launched in 2010 by the WWF with the aim of doubling the number of wild tigers by 2022 through a fifty-million-dollar investment in protection strategies. The efforts to save this remarkable feline are, however, at risk of being undermined by the unchecked infrastructural development under way across Asia.

Roads where tigers once hunted

This is the finding of the report titled The road ahead, produced by the WWF in collaboration with the consultancy firm Dalberg Global Development Advisors. According to the study, the significant increase in new infrastructure projects threatens the survival of tigers: by 2020, some 11,000 kilometres of roads, railways, canals, oil pipelines, gas pipelines and power lines are set to be built across the continent. This expansion will irreparably damage tiger habitat, increasing its fragmentation and intensifying conflict with local communities, and consequently poaching.

WWF calls for sustainable growth

"The global Tx2 project has given tigers a real chance of survival, but infrastructure plans in Asia could destroy all the recent gains and hopes for the future of the species," commented Mike Baltzer, head of WWF's Tx2 initiative. "Infrastructure is vital for Asia's development, but we need to ensure that this growth is sustainable."

Tigers need space

Currently, only around 3,890 tigers are believed to survive in the wild, compared to the 100,000 that existed less than a century ago. Some populations are showing a slight recovery, particularly in India, Russia, Nepal and Bhutan, while those in South-East Asia continue to decline. These large felines require extensive hunting territories: males can "occupy" up to seventy square kilometres of forest when prey is abundant, whereas in areas where prey is scarce, such as Russia, their territories can extend to as much as one thousand square kilometres. The construction of roads and railways fragments tiger habitat into patches too small to support a large number of individuals.

Humans can reach anywhere

Such infrastructure can also facilitate human access to previously inaccessible environments — the last refuges of tigers — increasing conflict between people and animals and the risk of collisions with vehicles. According to the report, for example, one project involves the construction of two four-lane motorways, railways, transmission lines, oil pipelines and gas pipelines that would cut through the Dawna Tenasserim Landscape, an area on the border between Thailand and Myanmar comprising more than 60,000 square kilometres of forest that is home to over 250 tigers. The Terai Arc Landscape, on the border between Nepal and India — a territory with one of the highest tiger densities — is also threatened by large-scale road and railway projects. Work on a 650-kilometre motorway has already begun, while a further 5,000 kilometres of roads and railways are planned.

Thinking about tigers at the design stage

Tiger conservation policies must therefore also take into account the growing threat posed by infrastructure development. "The countries involved must urgently integrate tiger and habitat conservation into development planning," said Baltzer. "The good news is that solutions exist and it is not too late. But if the countries concerned do not act now, the damage will be irreparable."