10th Parliament· 154 sittings on record · 30,475 speeches · latest 10 June 2026

The Hon. Gnanamuththu Srineshan

Illankai Tamil Arasu Kadchi· Batticaloa· 21 February 2025 ·Oral question: Oral Question: Compensation for Natural Disaster Damages (Q. First Round)

EnvironmentSecurity & Defence
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Gnanamuththu Srineshan asked the Minister of Environment for detailed data on Sri Lanka’s forest extent, elephant-suitable habitats, and the wild elephant population. He sought annual figures from 2020 to 2024 on human injuries and deaths caused by elephants and elephant deaths linked to human-elephant conflict. He also asked whether the elephant population exceeds available forest cover, what mechanisms exist to control it, whether such measures will be implemented, and what methods are available to reduce destruction caused by wild elephants.

Verbatim record (translated)

Machine-translated from Sinhala / Tamil / English

¶ 01 asked the Minister of Environment:

¶ 02 (a) Will he inform this House: (i) the extent of forests in Sri Lanka in acres; (ii) the extent of forests within that which have an environment suitable for wild elephants to live; (iii) the number of wild elephants living in such forests; (iv) whether he is aware that wild elephants kill humans and destroy their properties; and (v) from 2020 to 2024, separately, the number of persons attacked by wild elephants, the number killed by such attacks, and the number of wild elephants killed in human-elephant conflicts?

¶ 03 (b) Will he also inform this House: (i) whether he is aware that an elephant population overwhelming the forest cover is in existence; (ii) whether the wild elephant population has to be controlled proportionate to the forest cover; (iii) if so, the mechanisms available for it; (iv) whether they will be implemented in future; and (v) if so, whether there is any methodology for controlling the destruction caused by wild elephants?

¶ 04 (c) If not, why?

Provenance

Source
Hansard, Friday, 21 February 2025 ·No. 1740809173064396 ·English daily/uncorrected Hansard
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Cite as: The Hon. Gnanamuththu Srineshan. 10th Parliament, Parliament of Sri Lanka. Hansard, 21 February 2025. No. 1740809173064396. Politick, https://staging.politick.io/lk/speeches/3640