EMILY FENG, HOST:
Elephants are revered in Sri Lanka. There are more than 7,000 of them, and most of them live freely across the island, near villages and farms. But that intermingling is triggering deadly conflict, and the Mideast war is making it worse, as NPR's Diaa Hadid reports.
DIAA HADID, BYLINE: In a rice paddy field, farmer Gunasinghe Kapuga tells me the state of play between farmers and elephants in the central Matale district.
GUNASINGHE KAPUGA: (Speaking Sinhala).
HADID: "Obviously, it's war."
He nods to men digging mud out of shin-deep water, preparing the field for planting.
(SOUNDBITE OF WATER SPLASHING)
HADID: That hard work could be destroyed at any moment. Kapuga points to a young man and says, the other day, he chased an elephant away.
KAPUGA: (Speaking Sinhala).
HADID: Kapuga says, that's so dangerous. Elephants sometimes charge at farmers, kill them. And conservationists say, sometimes, farmers kill elephants.
DEVAKA WEERAKOON: They're shot. They have jaw bombs. They have nail bombs. These are all very inhumane means of killing.
HADID: We meet zoologist Devaka Weerakoon in a cafe. Jawbombs, he says, are explosives hidden in food. They shatter an elephant's mouth. They starve to death in agony. He says deadly incidents have about doubled over the past decade. 2023 was the worst year - 488 elephants, 184 people - mostly farmers - were killed.
Experts say this conflict is largely because over the decades, governments have transformed areas where elephants grazed into farmlands. Governments here have long tried to solve this problem by pushing elephants into national forests by using firecrackers, gunfire and drones. But elephants do bust out because there's not enough food in those forests for them to survive.
(SOUNDBITE OF FOOTSTEPS)
HADID: Those elephants keep farmer Gaamini Disanaayake awake, literally.
(SOUNDBITE OF CRICKETS CHIRPING)
HADID: Near the village of Bambaragahawatte, Disanaayake climbs up a bamboo ladder to a treehouse made with planks bound with twine. It overlooks his fields. These rickety treehouses dot the landscape. Farmers keep sentry in them through the nights.
GAAMINI DISANAAYAKE: (Speaking Sinhala).
HADID: Disanaayake says, elephants are just one hardship they face. There was the pandemic, then a brief ban on fertilizers, which collapsed yields. Fuel prices surged as the country defaulted on its debts. Last year, a cyclone.
DISANAAYAKE: (Speaking Sinhala).
HADID: Now, the Mideast war.
DISANAAYAKE: (Speaking Sinhala).
HADID: The war has pushed up fuel prices again, so Disanaayake can't afford to buy fuel to pump water to irrigate his onion crop. He wrote it off. The war has caused fertilizer prices to more than double. A bag is now $37. Disanaayake says he borrowed money to fertilize his mung bean crop, then bean prices collapsed. He says, if the war continues, there won't be food to eat. "How will I feed my family?"
DISANAAYAKE: (Speaking Sinhala).
HADID: And he says this war is going to make conflict worse with elephants. Because of price rises, farmers are spending more to plant less, and they'll be more aggressive in defending it from elephants. The rain and wind pick up. Tin sheets of the treehouse roof flap wildly.
(SOUNDBITE OF TIN SHEET BANGING)
HADID: The next day, Disanaayake calls while we're driving. He says, the heavy winds ripped off the treehouse roof, so he had to sleep at home. He returned to his fields in the morning only to find elephants trampled his crops.
(SOUNDBITE OF FOOTSTEPS)
HADID: We meet in his field.
There's a giant elephant footprint. You can just see where they trampled because it's just all smooshed.
Disanaayake repairs his treehouse and tells us, we feel bad for elephants. We know they don't have enough to eat.
DISANAAYAKE: (Speaking Sinhala).
HADID: In the capital Colombo, wildlife official Manjula Amararathna tells us...
MANJULA AMARARATHNA: It's a huge, difficult task to manage this issue.
HADID: They're deploying methods that conservationists champion, like erecting fences around agricultural lands. They're also deploying methods that conservationists say are counterproductive, like pushing elephants into protected parks, from where they escape. But there's one option they won't consider - culls.
AMARARATHNA: Our Buddhist religious culture - no one allowed to kill animals.
HADID: But Amararathna concedes, some farmers are killing elephants. Back in Bambaragahawatte, farmer Gaamini Disanaayake is appealing to the divine to protect his field.
DISANAAYAKE: (Speaking Sinhala).
HADID: Disanaayake has made an offering of boiled rice for the local demigod.
DISANAAYAKE: (Speaking Sinhala).
HADID: He tells us, "I'm praying to protect my field, my life, and the elephant - that he, too, won't be harmed." Diaa Hadid, NPR News, Bambaragahawatte, Sri Lanka.
(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC) Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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