The southern province of Dong Nai has proposed measures to conserve and prevent consanguineous mating in the herd of wild elephants there.

A wild elephant seen in Dinh Quan district

There are 14 elephants living in an area of some 53,000 hectares in Vinh Cuu, Dinh Quan and Tan Phu districts, according to the province’s forest protection division.

Le Viet Dung, deputy head of the division, suggested two plans to prevent consanguineous mating among the elephants. The first is to ask for the Vietnam Administration of Forestry’s permission to bring some elephants in other localities to Dong Nai to mate with local ones.

The other plan is promoting international cooperation in the work, he said, elaborating that Dong Nai can mate its elephants with others in regional countries.

The elephant herd in Dong Nai was seen most recently in Thanh Son commune of Dinh Quan district in late March.

Local residents said the animals often come to their farms to find food, destroying a large area of fruit trees such as mango, cashew, banana and sugar cane.

The forest protection division is carrying out an emergency elephant conservation project with a total cost of 85 billion VND (3.75 million USD). 

Accordingly, about 50km of electric fence will be built in Tan Phu, Dinh Quan and Vinh Cuu districts to prevent the conflict between elephants and human.

VNA