The government of Chhattisgarh has approved a project to create one of the three largest tiger reserves in India. According to Deccan Chronicle, its territory will cover about 3000 square kilometers in five districts of the state, TASS reports.

The reserve will not only help preserve the population of these large cats, but will also become an incentive for the development of ecotourism and the creation of new jobs in the region. Previously, the project was hampered by the discovery of mineral deposits on the proposed territory of the reserve, but now it has been decided to abandon their development in favor of protecting tigers.

According to the relevant ministry, India is now home to more than 3,600 tigers, which is about 75% of the world population of these animals. Since the 1970s, the country has had a tiger conservation program, thanks to which their numbers have grown more than 2.5 times over the past two decades and continue to increase by about 6% annually. Recently, the program has been actively introducing modern animal monitoring technologies and involving local residents and forestry workers to assess the population.

India currently has 54 tiger reserves, covering more than 78 000 square kilometers, accounting for 2,3% of the country's land area. The leading state in terms of tiger numbers is Madhya Pradesh (785), followed by Karnataka (563), Uttarakhand (560) and Maharashtra (444).