Assam's Purnima Devi Barman Receives 'Green Oscar' Whitley Gold Award 2024

A wildlife biologist from Assam has been honoured with a leading UK wildlife charity award for her conservation efforts of the endangered Greater Adjutant Stork and its wetland habitat.

Dr Purnima Devi Barman won the GBP 1,00,000 Whitley Gold Award from the Whitley Fund for Nature (WFN), which supports grassroots conservation leaders from around the world, at a Royal Geographical Society awards ceremony in London on Wednesday evening.

Ms Barman received the trophy from charity patron Princess Anne – the Princess Royal, the sister of King Charles III, in recognition of her conservation of the stork known locally as “Hargila” in Assamese.

“Their feathers, their intense blue eyes, the sounds of their beaks were my childhood friends,” said Barman, a past winner of the Whitley Award in 2017 for her efforts.

“I love everything about them, they are very inspiring. But everyone else seemed to hate them,” she shared.

The Gold Award from WFN noted how the numbers of the Hargila – translating as “bone-swallower” – had dwindled to an estimated 450 birds in Northeast India before Ms Barman's intervention. Changing attitudes and galvanising local people, primarily women, to safeguard nests, and working with her team at the local wildlife NGO Aaranyak, their numbers have now quadrupled to more than 1,800.

“Her project aims to grow community-driven conservation initiatives to bolster the number of Greater Adjutant breeding pairs, expanding support of local women to grow the ‘Hargila Army' of ‘Stork sister' advocates. She will also establish a collaborative network of WFN alumni, students, scientists and policymakers, providing conservation education and promoting a knowledge exchange programme,” the WFN said.

The Whitley Awards also celebrated six other grassroots conservationists – from Guyana, Papua New Guinea, Bhutan, Cameroon, Nepal and Brazil – for their locally-led solutions to the global biodiversity and climate crises.

Ms Barman wants to double the global population of the bird to 5,000 by 2030, working across the stork's range in India and Cambodia, through a series of scale-up measures.

A mother to teenage twin daughters, Ms Barman added ''When children accompany their mothers in the Hargila Army, it imbues our mission with deeper meaning.'' According to experts, the Hargila brings value to the landscapes that it inhabits, including through its penchant for consuming decaying organic matter. With a wingspan of 2.4 metres, the Hargila can reach 1.2 metres in height. They build nests that are expanded to as large as 1 meter wide as the chicks grow.

Far from negatively impacting the hygiene of its environment, the bird plays a vital role in nutrient recycling and maintaining ecosystem health. The storks are an essential ecological pillar in Assam's wetlands which comprise more than 15 per cent of the state, the experts said.

Ms Barman's scale-up efforts will involve providing conservation education to more than 20,000 Assamese students and a knowledge exchange programme between students at Bihar University and the University of Assam.

The awards are won competitively following a global search and rigorous application process, assessed by an expert judging panel and winners receive GBP 50,000 in project funding over one year, in addition to elevated profile, new connections and training.

The winners also will join a community of over 200 Whitley Award alumni – a network of peers across the Global South with whom they can share expertise, resources and support. 

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