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The Snow Leopard Conservancy Trust India, based in the Ladakh District of Jammu and Kashmir State, has projects both inside and outside Hemis National Park. Established in 1981, the 3,350 square-kilometer park offers excellent habitat for snow leopards and harbors four species of wild sheep and goats, giving it international biodiversity importance. About 1,600 people live in the park in more than a dozen settlements.

Tourism provides an important source of income to supplement Ladakh’s mainly pastoral livelihoods. In collaboration with local and international partners, we have built upon the existing opportunities, working with villagers to empower them to be the best guardians of the snow leopard. Our award-winning Himalayan Homestays program preserves the traditional culture and improves the local economy. Corral predator-proofing helps protect the fragile, high-altitude ecosystem and the snow leopards who make it their home.

The Snow Leopard Conservancy India Trust has just released the first issue of a beautiful newsletter, Shan.

How does Community-Based Eco-Tourism Save Snow Leopards?

Goal — Local communities become guardians of healthy populations of snow leopards.

How? By minimizing livestock depredation while empowering local people to directly benefit from an ecosystem that includes snow leopards.

We build on already-existing opportunities for generating income. We train and support village women’s cooperatives to offer tourists Traditional Himalayan Homestays and Parachute Cafés. Solar cookers, provided as a subsidized loan, contribute to the hygienic, ecologically friendly, and sustainable operation of these facilities. They will be repaid at about 50% of cost, which goes into a community improvement fund. We also train men and women to be village-based nature guides, offering visitors short walks or day hikes to look for plants, birds and other wildlife.

These eco-tourism activities preserve the traditional culture while improving livelihoods; and it all adds up to communities being willing and able to protect their fragile, high-altitude ecosystem, and the snow leopards who make it their home.

Read about the successful winter 2007 Quest for the Snow Leopard.

You can visit beautiful and remote Ladakh if you join the Snow Leopard Conservancy on one of our special Snow Leopard Treks.

A Map of the Snow Leopard’s Range.

This map shows the 12 or 13 countries of South and Central Asia where the rare, beautiful, and endangered snow leopard can be found: Afghanistan, Bhutan, China, India, Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, Nepal, Mongolia, Pakistan, Russia, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan and possibly also Myanmar (Burma). Snow leopard range spreads across 1.2 to 1.6 million km², comprised of mountainous rangelands at elevations of 3,000 to over 5000 m (10,000 – 17,000 feet) in the Himalaya and Tibetan Plateau, but as low as 600 m (2,000 feet) in Russia and Mongolia. This equals an area of 463,000 – 618,000 square miles, nearly equivalent in area to the nations of France, Germany, Italy and Spain.

Snow leopards like steep, rugged terrain well broken by cliffs, ridges, gullies, and rocky outcrops. while in Mongolia and Tibet may inhabit relatively flat or rolling terrain if sufficient cover is present. A snow leopard’s home range varies from 12 to 39 km² (4.6 – 15 square miles) in productive habitat in Nepal to 500 km² or more (over 200 square miles) in Mongolia with its open terrain and lower ungulate density, Densities range from less than 0.1 to 10 or more individuals per 100 km² (about 39 square miles) but current knowledge is insufficient for generating a reliable range-wide population estimate. The cat’s habitat is among the least productive of the world’s rangelands due to low temperatures, high aridity and harsh climatic conditions.

Total numbers are estimated at 4,500-7,500. Snow leopards are protected in nearly all countries under national and international laws. They are listed in Appendix 1 of CITES (Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora, 1977), which sets strict regulations on export or import of animals or their body parts. Only,Tajikistan is not signatory to the CITES agreement.

Traditional pastoralism and agro-pastoralism are the predominant land uses and sources of local livelihood in snow leopard habitat, with seven range countries having over 25% of land area under permanent pasture, more than 50% of their human population involved in agro-pastoralism, more than 40% living below national poverty levels, and average per capita annual incomes of US$250-400. Although relatively few humans live in snow leopard habitat, their use of the land is pervasive, resulting in ever-increasing human-wildlife conflict even within protected areas.

Up to a third of the snow leopard’s range falls along international borders, some of which are politically sensitive, complicating trans-boundary conservation initiatives. In fact, there have been several wars over the last 50 years, along with low-intensity factional or international conflicts that continue today in countries like Afghanistan. See the country pages of this website for the Snow Leopard Conservancy’s program areas.