Cheetah Conservation Fund (CCF) staff will travel to India today to deliver eight wild cheetahs to the south Asia country.
According to the CCF, these cheetahs are the first to be translocated from southern Africa to Asia to create a new meta population, the Namibian reported on Friday.
The Cheetah Reintroduction Project, which aims to restore the population of cheetahs in the country, will formally take off on the occasion of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s birthday, September 17, 2022.
Namibia, the country that has traditionally had the greatest density of wild cheetah, is donating the first eight individuals as part of a larger, multi-year agreement to help conserve the species through India’s Project Cheetah,” the statement read.
Cheetahs, one of the oldest big cat species with ancestors dating back to about 8.5 million years, were once widely dispersed throughout Asia and Africa but now occupy less than nine percent of their historic range, according to the Hindustan Times.
Other landmark projects supporting the programme include the Restoration of Tigers in Panna Tiger Reserve and the Reintroduction of Gaur (Indian Bison) in Bandhavgarh. Now, the Kuno National Park will boast cheetahs from Africa, marking a fresh start for the species in the country.
Cheetah was officially declared extinct in India, in 1952.
Under the Species Recovery Program of the Government of India, species that become extinct are restored in their historic natural habitat.
IOL
