How to Protect Pakistan's Snow Leopards? Try AI

Snow leopards are critically endangered. Pakistan is home to more than 300 of the planet’s last remaining snow leopards. That is the third largest population of the big cats in the world. Protecting the species is a priority for the Asian country. But hungry leopards often attack farmers' flocks. Farmers, in turn, kill the leopards.

A new artificial intelligence (AI) program is designed to change that.

Asif Iqbal is a conservationist. He works with World Wildlife Fund Pakistan (WWFP). He showed a reporter at the BBC how the program works. They watched a feline predator caught on a remote camera. "It's a mother leopard, looks like she's marking her territory," Iqbal said. 

In total, 10 cameras have been installed. They've been placed in the mountains near villages. They are powered by solar panels.

The cameras record movement. Their footage is sent to computers. They use an AI program to scan the footage. It identifies animals that pass by.

If a snow leopard is detected, the computers send text alerts to farmers in the valley. They can then move their flocks to safety before leopards arrive. WWFP hopes that doing so will reduce leopard deaths. It also hopes to protect the farmers’ livelihoods. Eventually, the leopards may learn to hunt higher in the mountains.

Iqbal says that the plan is promising. But there are challenges still to overcome. Not all villagers have cell phones. Those that do can sometimes have trouble finding a signal in the valley. Still, the AI program is an important first step, Iqbal notes.

Reflect: If you were tasked with using technology to help animals and people live peacefully together, what kind of invention would you create?