Why ECO MAXIMUS Exists

Sri Lanka is home to about a tenth of the estimated global total of 40,000 Asian elephants in the wild, elephants are not being killed in Sri Lanka for their tusks, as tuskers are rare; they are not being killed for meat, since no one eats elephant meat; they are not being killed for their hide, since there is no market for elephant hide in the leather industry.

Instead elephants are being killed simply because they interfere with agriculture.

Since 1950, it is likely that more than 4,000 elephants would have been lost as a direct consequence of the conflict between man and elephant.

The elephant is running out of space in Sri Lanka.  Most of the protected areas inhabited by elephants are small, less than 1,000 sq. km in size, nevertheless elephants, especially the bulls, may range over hundreds of square kilometers in the course of a season.  Their sheer size and gargantuan appetite mean that elephants and people cannot live together where agriculture is the dominant form of land use, unless the damage they cause to farmers can be compensated. There are no easy solutions for resolving the human elephant conflict in Sri Lanka.  Much will depend on how rural people perceive the worth of the elephant.

To stop the wanton killing of elephants requires changing the perceptions of the farmers who suffer constant depredations from the animals.  Many are now convinced that the only way elephants and human beings can exist successfully in the same environment is through finding ways to use the elephant as a sustainable economic resource.

Elephant dung is an end product. It provides a way of converting a liability into an asset in conflict areas. It is also a commodity that is freely available at anytime.  On average an adult elephant produces about 180-200 kg of dung per day.

Until now, no one had any use for it.  However, project Maximus designed to manufacture paper from elephant dung may help change the perceptions of the farmers of the economic value of the elephant in conflict areas.  The project started in 1997, has successfully produced and marketed what is known as “pachyderm paper" made out of 75% elephant dung.  The dung of the elephant takes form as note-books, cards, badges, boxes and bags etc. where the only limitation is one's imagination.  These products have proved extremely popular among varied segments of the local population and foreign tourists.

Even though elephant dung cannot resolve the on going human-elephant conflict in Sri Lanka, its use for the benefit of the farmers who suffer from elephant depredations will certainly go some way towards raising the tolerance of the farmers towards the elephant.

We believe that if the elephant is used as an economic asset so that it contributes meaningfully to the welfare of people, then the people themselves will not like to see it disappear from their area.

In the final analysis, all of our conservation efforts would be futile, if we do not have the support of the local communities.  The elephant dung can play an important role in the conservation of its provider.