The Great Nicobar Biosphere Reserve encompasses a large part (some 85%) of the island of

Great Nicobar Great Nicobar is the southernmost and largest of the Nicobar Islands of India, north of Sumatra. History The Nicobar Island has been well known to Indian mariners since the time of the seafaring Cholas https://www.britannica.com/place/Nicoba ...

, the largest of the Nicobar Islands in the

India India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...

n Union Territory of

Andaman and Nicobar Islands The Andaman and Nicobar Islands is a union territory of India consisting of 572 islands, of which 37 are inhabited, at the junction of the Bay of Bengal and the Andaman Sea. The territory is about north of Aceh in Indonesia and separated f ...

. The Nicobars lie in the

Bay of Bengal The Bay of Bengal is the northeastern part of the Indian Ocean, bounded on the west and northwest by India, on the north by Bangladesh, and on the east by Myanmar and the Andaman and Nicobar Islands of India. Its southern limit is a line betwee ...

, eastern

Indian Ocean The Indian Ocean is the third-largest of the world's five oceanic divisions, covering or ~19.8% of the water on Earth's surface. It is bounded by Asia to the north, Africa to the west and Australia to the east. To the south it is bounded by t ...

, 190 km to the north of the

Indonesia Indonesia, officially the Republic of Indonesia, is a country in Southeast Asia and Oceania between the Indian and Pacific oceans. It consists of over 17,000 islands, including Sumatra, Java, Sulawesi, and parts of Borneo and New Guine ...

n island of Sumatra. The Reserve has a total core area of approximately 885 km², surrounded by a 12 km-wide "forest buffer zone".https://web.archive.org/web/20060208095618/http://forest.and.nic.in/frst-great%20nicobar%20biosphere%20reserve1.htm Dept. Environment and Forest, A & N Administration In year 2013 it was included in the list of Man and Biosphere program of

UNESCO The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization is a specialized agency of the United Nations (UN) aimed at promoting world peace and security through international cooperation in education, arts, sciences and culture. It ...

to promote sustainable development based on local community effort and sound science.

Geography

The Reserve was formality created in January 2013. It incorporates two

National parks of India National parks in India are IUCN (International Union of Conservation of Nature) category II protected areas. India's first national park was established in 1936, now known as Jim Corbett National Park, in Uttarakhand. By 1970, India only had ...

, which were gazetted in 1992: the larger Campbell Bay National Park on the northern part of the island, and

Galathea National Park Galathea National Park is a national park located in the Union Territory of Andaman and Nicobar Islands, India. It is located on the island of Great Nicobar in the Nicobar Islands, which lie in the eastern Indian Ocean (Bay of Bengal). The tot ...

in the southern interior. The non-

Biosphere The biosphere (from Greek βίος ''bíos'' "life" and σφαῖρα ''sphaira'' "sphere"), also known as the ecosphere (from Greek οἶκος ''oîkos'' "environment" and σφαῖρα), is the worldwide sum of all ecosystems. It can also ...

portions of the island (set aside for agriculture, forestry and settlements) are confined to the southwestern and southeastern coastal reaches. The reserve has a total area of 103,870 ha. The core area of 53,623 ha comprises Cambell Bay and Galathea national parks. A buffer area of 34,877 ha includes forested lands adjacent to and between the two parks. There is also a transitional area of 10,070 ha, including 5,300 marine hectares."Great Nicobar". Man and Biosphere Programme, United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO). Accessed 1 August 2021. http://www.unesco.org/new/en/natural-sciences/environment/ecological-sciences/biosphere-reserves/asia-and-the-pacific/india/great-nicobar

Flora and fauna

The environment is classified by the

World Wide Fund for Nature The World Wide Fund for Nature Inc. (WWF) is an international non-governmental organization founded in 1961 that works in the field of wilderness preservation and the reduction of human impact on the environment. It was formerly named the Wor ...

tropical and subtropical moist broadleaf forests Tropical and subtropical moist broadleaf forests (TSMF), also known as tropical moist forest, is a subtropical and tropical forest habitat type defined by the World Wide Fund for Nature. Description TSMF is generally found in large, discon ...

biome A biome () is a biogeographical unit consisting of a biological community that has formed in response to the physical environment in which they are found and a shared regional climate. Biomes may span more than one continent. Biome is a broader ...

, and located in the Indomalayan realm. The reserve is home to many

species In biology, a species is the basic unit of classification and a taxonomic rank of an organism, as well as a unit of biodiversity. A species is often defined as the largest group of organisms in which any two individuals of the appropriate s ...

of plants and animals, often

endemic Endemism is the state of a species being found in a single defined geographic location, such as an island, state, nation, country or other defined zone; organisms that are indigenous to a place are not endemic to it if they are also found else ...

to the Andaman and Nicobars

biogeographic Biogeography is the study of the distribution of species and ecosystems in geographic space and through geological time. Organisms and biological communities often vary in a regular fashion along geographic gradients of latitude, elevation, ...

region. Species of

fauna Fauna is all of the animal life present in a particular region or time. The corresponding term for plants is ''flora'', and for fungi, it is ''funga''. Flora, fauna, funga and other forms of life are collectively referred to as ''Biota (ecology ...

in the reserve include: Nicobar scrubfowl (''Megapodius nicobariensis'', a

megapode The megapodes, also known as incubator birds or mound-builders, are stocky, medium-large, chicken-like birds with small heads and large feet in the family Megapodiidae. Their name literally means "large foot" and is a reference to the heavy legs ...

bird), the edible-nest swiftlet (''Aerodramus fuciphagus''), the

Nicobar long-tailed macaque The Nicobar long-tailed macaque (''Macaca fascicularis umbrosa'', popularly known as the Nicobar monkey) is a subspecies of the crab-eating macaque (''M. fascicularis''), endemic to the Nicobar Islands in the Bay of Bengal. This primate is fou ...

(''Macaca fascicularis umbrosa''),

saltwater crocodile The saltwater crocodile (''Crocodylus porosus'') is a crocodilian native to saltwater habitats and brackish wetlands from India's east coast across Southeast Asia and the Sundaic region to northern Australia and Micronesia. It has been list ...

(''Crocodylus porosus''), Andaman water monitor (''Varanus salvator andamanensis''), giant leatherback sea turtle (''Dermochelys coriacea''),

Malayan box turtle The Amboina box turtle or Southeast Asian box turtle (''Cuora amboinensis'') is a species of Asian box turtle. It is found in the Nicobar Islands, eastern India (Assam), Bangladesh, Myanmar, Thailand, Cambodia, Laos, central and southern Vietn ...

(''Cuora amboinensis''), Nicobar tree shrew (''Tupaia nicobarica''),

reticulated python The reticulated python (''Malayopython reticulatus'') is a python species native to South and Southeast Asia. It is the world's longest snake, and is among the three heaviest. It is listed as least concern on the IUCN Red List because of its w ...

(''Python reticulatus'') and the giant robber crab (or coconut crab, ''Birgus latro'').

Indigenous inhabitants

The Great Nicobar Biosphere Reserve also incorporates territories and traditional lands of the

indigenous Indigenous may refer to: *Indigenous peoples *Indigenous (ecology), presence in a region as the result of only natural processes, with no human intervention *Indigenous (band), an American blues-rock band *Indigenous (horse), a Hong Kong racehorse ...

Nicobarese and

Shompen The Shompen or Shom Pen are the indigenous people of the interior of Great Nicobar Island, part of the Indian union territory of Andaman and Nicobar Islands. The Shompen are a designated Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes, Scheduled Tribe. ...

peoples.

References

National biosphere reserves of India Great Nicobar Island {{AndamanNicobar-geo-stub

Geography

Flora and fauna

Indigenous inhabitants

See also

References