INTERNATIONAL TIGER DAY

International Tiger Day or Global Tiger Day is celebrated each year on July 29 as per the decision taken at the Saint Petersburg Declaration on Tiger Conservation that was signed in 2010.

The day is celebrated to boost awareness about the need for tiger conservation and 13 tiger-range countries decided to double their number of tigers by 2022 at the St.Petersburg Summit.

The Global Tiger Day 2020 slogan is ‘Their Survival is in Our Hands’.

According to the World Wildlife Fund (WWF), 95% of the tiger population has been lost from the beginning of the 20th century. There are only 3900 tigers in the wild now in the whole world. Last year, the whole nation celebrated when the Tiger census was revealed highlighting India’s achievement of nearly 33% increase in the tiger population.

However, there is still a need to create immense amount of awareness around tiger conservation and build a safe natural habitat for this incredible species.

The main reasons for the loss of tiger population is poaching, climate change, and the destruction of their natural habitat.

Saving tigers is equivalent to conserving the Ecosystem

Tiger is symbol of wilderness and well-being of the ecosystem. By conserving and saving tigers the entire wilderness ecosystem is conserved. In nature, barring human beings and their domesticates, rest of the ecosystem is wild. Hence conserving wilderness is important and crucial to maintain the life support system. So saving tiger amounts to saving the ecosystem which is crucial for man's own survival.
Tigers play a pivotal role in the health of the ecosystem. Tigers constitute the top carnivores in the ecosystem and is at the apex of the food chain. The removal of a top carnivore from an ecosystem can have an impact on the relative abundance of herbivore species within a guild. Along with other major carnivores as leopard it acts as a control mechanism for herbivores or consumers.
The interdependency of living forms in a food chain is obvious as the wild tiger is dependant upon herbivores for its survival where he maintains there population which in turn prevents the grasslands from being overgrazed. The herbivores depend upon the producers as grasses, herbs, shrubs, algae, fungi and large trees for survival and they in turn maintain a balance in vegetation by controlling the extent of vegetation or flora. Birds survive on herbs, shrubs and trees on fruits and nectar and in turn act as seed dispersal agent for them to spread the population of the floral elements in an ecosystem. Thus all life forms including tiger are interlinked with each other in an ecosystem and their survival depends upon how intact the ecosystem is.
Top carnivores, tigers, have an important role to play in the structuring of communities and ultimately of ecosystems. Thus, the preservation of tigers becomes an important consideration.
Tigers occupy an important place in the Indian culture. Since ages, it has been the symbol of magnificence, power, beauty and fierceness and has been associated with bravery and valour. The tiger also has a significant place in Hindu mythology as the vehicle of Goddess Durga.