The fourth cycle of the All India Tiger Estimation 2018 has entered the Guinness World Record for being the world’s largest camera trap wildlife survey.

The country now has an estimated 2967 tigers as per the latest census. With this number, India is home to nearly 75 percent of the global tiger population and has already fulfilled its resolve of doubling tiger numbers, made at St. Petersburg in 2010, well ahead of the target year of 2022.

The citation at the Guinness World Record website says the fourth iteration of the survey - conducted in 2018-19 - was the most comprehensive to date, in terms of both resource and data amassed.

Camera traps were placed in 26,838 locations across 141 different sites and surveyed an effective area of 1 lakh 21 thousand 337 square kilometres. From the photographs, 2,461 individual tigers were identified using stripe-pattern-recognition software.

The All India Tiger Estimation done quadrennially is steered by the National Tiger Conservation Authority with technical backstopping from the Wildlife Institute of India and implemented by State Forest Departments and partners. The latest results of 2018 had shown that India now has an estimated 2967 tigers out of which 2461 individual tigers have been photo captured.