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Why Tigers Matter
 Human welfare and economic
development in Asia depends on the same clean water, clean air, natural
flood controls and other forest resources that tigers need. Because
tigers are poised at the top of the food chain, if we can maintain
healthy tiger populations in Asia’s wild lands, we can ensure that
there are healthy habitats and prey populations present to support them.
Tigers need extensive, intact landscapes and act as an umbrella species
— by saving tigers you save other plants and animals that share
their range. Renowned ecologist E.O. Wilson eloquently captures the flip
side of this coin: “Tigers…are predestined by their perch at
the top of the food web to be big in size and sparse in numbers. They
live on such a small portion of life’s available energy as always
to skirt the edge of extinction, and they are the first to suffer when
the ecosystem around them starts to erode.”
Tigers are also majestic symbols for many ancient and modern
cultures. Tiger images emblazon temples throughout Bhutan, China, India,
Nepal, Thailand and Tibet; every twelfth year of the Chinese calendar is
dedicated to the tiger; and India’s national animal is also the
namesake of Bangladesh’s national cricket team, The Bengal Tigers.
Given the tremendous historical and cultural significance of these
animals, it is tragically ironic that Asia’s “tiger
economies” are now prospering at the expense of wild tigers.
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