Critically analyse India's landscape-level approach to wildlife conservation as exemplified by Project Lion.

The Asiatic Lion, a Schedule-I species endemic to the Gir landscape, is conserved not within a fenced park but through an explicit "species conservation over a large landscape" approach, in which the Greater Gir Region is managed via Zone Plans and Theme Plans rather than protected-area boundaries alone [1]. Project Lion demonstrates both the strength and the structural limits of this model.

Design features of the landscape approach

• Beyond-PA planning: management zones covering forests, revenue land and human settlements in the Greater Gir Region [1].
• Cooperative federalism: funded under the Centrally Sponsored Scheme–Development of Wildlife Habitat on a 60:40 Centre–State ratio, with a central share of Rs 97.85 crore [1].
• Multi-sectoral integration: veterinary care, disease control and community involvement built into the project design [1].
• Technology-based monitoring: radio-collaring, camera traps and GIS-based tracking underpin population estimation [2].

Demonstrated gains

• Population rose from 674 (2020) to 891 (2025) — a 32% increase, and over 70% growth in a decade [3].
• Lions have dispersed beyond Gir, with Barda Wildlife Sanctuary emerging as a satellite habitat, hosting World Lion Day 2025 [3].
• The model is being projected globally through the International Big Cat Alliance and the 'Lion' Species Spotlight Programme at Sasan Gir [4].

Critical limitations

• Single-population risk: the entire subspecies remains in one contiguous landscape, leaving it exposed to epidemics and genetic bottlenecks; a second wild population outside Gujarat is still unrealised [5].
• Conflict externalities: dispersal into human-dominated areas raises livestock depredation and accidental mortality from wells and linear infrastructure.
• Capacity dependence: outcomes rest heavily on one state's administrative and financial strength, making replication across inter-state landscapes untested.
• Community coexistence with pastoral Maldharis remains largely customary rather than an institutionalised benefit-sharing framework.

The Gir experience confirms that landscape-level, community-linked planning outperforms island-style protection. Consolidating it now requires an assured second habitat, conflict-compensation and eco-development mechanisms with legal backing, and extension of the zone-plan template to other big-cat landscapes — aligning species recovery with SDG 15's mandate on halting biodiversity loss.