Decline and Growth in Camel, Yak, and Mithun Populations in India

India’s livestock map is far more diverse than cattle and buffaloes alone. Tucked within the cold deserts of Rajasthan, the icy heights of the Himalayas, and the dense forests of the Northeast are three unique species – the camel, the yak, and the mithun – each telling a very different story of survival. While camel numbers dropped sharply from 9.12 lakh in 1997 to 6.32 lakh in 2003, populations of the yak and the mithun showed positive trends, reaching 0.65 lakh and 2.78 lakh respectively by the same year. Understanding why these trajectories diverged so sharply reveals a great deal about land use, utility, culture, and conservation priorities in India.

The camel: a declining “ship of the desert”
Why utility collapse drove the numbers down
Habitat challenges and the shrinking pastoral landscape
The yak: the highland lifeline
Factors behind yak population growth in the early 2000s
Challenges that followed: a reversal in recent decades
The mithun: the “cattle of the mountains”
Cultural significance: more than livestock
Mithun as a meat and production animal
Comparing the three: utility, habitat, and cultural value
Conservation status and the road ahead

The camel: a declining “ship of the desert”

The Indian camel – all of them belonging to the single-humped dromedary species (Camelus dromedarius) – was once central to the economy and culture of arid western India. According to National Geographic, about 80 percent of India’s camels live in Rajasthan, where they have historically been bred for transport, ploughing, wool, and milk. The camel population peaked at around 1.1 million in the 1960s, driven largely by demand for camel carts as draught animals.

The decline that began in the early 1990s accelerated sharply through the early 2000s. By 1997, India had 9.12 lakh camels; by 2003, that number had fallen to 6.32 lakh. Research published in Agricultural Reviews identifies the core drivers: changing lifestyles, the rise of motorized transport, and poor economic incentives for communities that traditionally reared camels, such as the Raika and Rabari pastoralists. New roads, irrigation infrastructure like the Indira Gandhi Canal, and the expansion of wind and solar farms have all displaced camel-grazing grounds, especially in the Thar Desert.

Why utility collapse drove the numbers down

The camel’s value was historically tied to its role as a working animal. Sahapedia’s documentation of camel cultures notes that demand for male camels as draught animals declined steadily through the late 20th century and had nearly disappeared by the 2000s. Once male camels ceased to be economically productive, breeders had little financial reason to maintain large herds. Female camels, which were retained for milk, were fewer in proportion, and the overall herd size shrank accordingly.

The situation worsened after a 2015 Rajasthan law that banned the inter-state transport and slaughter of camels, intending to protect the species. Scroll.in reported that livestock keepers say the law had the opposite effect – it disincentivised the keeping of camels, particularly males, because owners could no longer sell or trade them freely. The decline has continued: a peer-reviewed study in the Saudi Journal of Biological Sciences confirmed that India’s camel population dropped 37 percent between 2012 and 2019, and has fallen 75 percent since 1992. By 2019, only about 2.5 lakh camels remained in the country.

Habitat challenges and the shrinking pastoral landscape

Beyond reduced economic utility, habitat loss has been a major driver of the camel’s decline. India Fellow’s reporting on camel pastoralism highlights that industrialisation, mining activity, and the invasion of the thorny Prosopis juliflora shrub have diminished grazing fields in Gujarat’s Kutch region. Traditional migration routes used by camel-herding communities are increasingly blocked by fences, new infrastructure, and land-use changes. Without access to open grazing land, maintaining large camel herds has become logistically and financially unviable for pastoralist families.

One emerging solution is camel milk. A Draft Camel Policy Paper from India’s Department of Animal Husbandry and Dairying calls the decline a crisis of survival and proposes promoting the camel milk economy alongside breed conservation and securing grazing rights. Brands like Amul have begun experimenting with camel milk-based products, and Sarhad Dairy in Gujarat has built a small but growing market. Whether this is enough to reverse decades of decline remains uncertain.

The yak: the highland lifeline

The yak (Bos grunniens), often called the “ship of cold regions,” is one of the most uniquely adapted large mammals on Earth. FAO documentation on yak genetic resources describes how yaks can graze at altitudes up to 6,000 metres above sea level, even at temperatures as low as -40°C, thanks to their broad chest, spacious lungs, and high red blood cell count. In India, yak rearing is concentrated in Arunachal Pradesh, Sikkim, Uttarakhand, Himachal Pradesh, Ladakh, and Jammu and Kashmir – all high-altitude states where crop agriculture is nearly impossible above 3,000 metres.

Yaks are genuinely multipurpose animals. They provide milk, meat, wool, hides, dung for fuel, and serve as pack animals capable of carrying 50-60 kg loads across the roughest Himalayan terrain. For communities like the Changpas of Ladakh, the Brokpas, and the Bhutia, yaks are the economic and cultural foundation of highland life. By 2003, India’s yak population had reached approximately 0.65 lakh, reflecting a period of relative stability.

Factors behind yak population growth in the early 2000s

The modest growth in yak numbers through the late 1990s and early 2000s was linked to sustained community dependence on yaks in regions where no viable alternative existed. Unlike camels, whose utility was replaceable by machines, yaks remain indispensable in extreme-altitude terrain. Their ability to thrive on frozen, wilted grasses and lichens during winter – feed that no other large domestic animal can survive on – makes them irreplaceable in high-altitude animal husbandry. The National Research Centre on Yaks, established to improve yak productivity and encourage highland farming, also played a role in stabilising numbers during this period.

Challenges that followed: a reversal in recent decades

While the early 2000s showed a positive trend, the trajectory has since reversed. Mongabay India’s reporting on yak breeding found that the population fell from 77,000 in 2012 to 58,000 in 2019 – a decline of roughly 25 percent. Climate change is causing heat stress during warmer months at high altitudes, disrupting mating cycles and overall reproductive health. Closed international borders with China have cut off genetic exchange, leading to inbreeding within small herds. Pasturelands at high altitudes are degrading due to overgrazing, invasive plants, and erratic monsoons. Younger generations are also abandoning the profession, attracted by more stable incomes in government service or lower-altitude work.

A 2025 genomics study in BMC Genomics confirmed that Indian yaks show significant genetic differentiation from Chinese and wild yak cohorts, underlining the importance of their conservation as a distinct genetic resource. Arunachali yak is the only Indian breed officially registered so far, and protecting its genetic diversity is now a priority for animal husbandry researchers.

The mithun: the “cattle of the mountains”

Of the three species discussed here, the mithun (Bos frontalis) is arguably the least known outside its home region – and yet it carries profound economic, cultural, and ecological weight in northeast India. ScienceDirect’s overview of mithun biology describes it as a semi-domesticated bovine endemic to the tropical rainforests of Arunachal Pradesh, Nagaland, Manipur, and Mizoram, believed to be a domesticated descendant of the wild gaur (Bos gaurus) with origins going back about 8,000 years. India holds approximately 97-98 percent of the world’s entire mithun population.

By 2003, India’s mithun population had reached 2.78 lakh – an increase from 1.77 lakh recorded in the 1997 census. Livestock Research for Rural Development notes that the 2003 census recorded 2,46,315 mithuns nationally, with Arunachal Pradesh alone accounting for the largest share. This growth reflected the sustained cultural and economic relevance of mithun among tribal communities across the northeastern hill states.

Cultural significance: more than livestock

India Today NE’s coverage of mithun importance describes how mithun is considered equivalent to gold in tribal barter systems – a measure of personal wealth, a medium for settling disputes, and an essential bride price in marriage customs. For tribes like the Nyishi, Adi, Galo, and Apatani, the number of mithuns a family owns directly reflects their social standing. Mithun is sacrificed in religious ceremonies, offered during death rituals, and slaughtered at community feasts. The Green Witch Chronicles notes that in Mishmi culture, the heads of sacrificed mithuns displayed on the walls of a house are marks of prestige – killing one outside of ritual context is considered a cultural transgression.

Mithun as a meat and production animal

Beyond its cultural role, mithun has real commercial potential. Its meat is considered tender and of high quality, and its milk – though produced in smaller quantities – is nutritionally rich with high fat and protein content. Research published on the mithun’s agronomic potential confirms that mithun leather is superior to cattle leather, and that there is significant scope to develop mithun as an organic meat and milk producer. The Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI) has since recognised mithun as a food animal, opening formal pathways for its meat to enter regulated markets – a development that could further incentivise its rearing.

Mithun is reared under a free-range, semi-wild system in community forests, feeding on jungle forages, tree fodders, shrubs, and herbs. Owners typically lure them home with common salt when needed. A 2026 review in a ScienceDirect journal notes that this low-input rearing system keeps costs down but also exposes mithun to predation, forest shrinkage, and the risk of over-harvesting during festivals and elections. The long-term sustainability of the population depends on balancing these cultural practices with scientific conservation measures.

Comparing the three: utility, habitat, and cultural value

The contrasting population trends of the camel, yak, and mithun between 1997 and 2003 essentially reflect three different relationships between animals and the communities that rear them. The camel’s decline is a story of eroded utility – as roads, mechanised farming, and urban development replaced the camel’s traditional economic roles, there was little financial logic for pastoralists to maintain large herds, especially in the absence of supportive land and trade policies. The yak’s relative stability, and the mithun’s growth, tell a different story: both animals occupy ecological and cultural niches where no substitutes exist.

The yak remains the only viable large animal for communities living above 3,000 metres, where it provides food, warmth, fuel, and transport simultaneously. The mithun’s growth through this period was sustained by deep cultural attachment among tribal communities, where the animal functions as currency, ritual offering, and social capital. IAS Gyan’s analysis points out that the mithun is the state animal of both Arunachal Pradesh and Nagaland – a designation that reflects not just biodiversity pride, but genuine socio-economic dependence.

Conservation status and the road ahead

All three species face threats that require active policy attention. The 20th Livestock Census (2019) released by India’s Ministry of Fisheries, Animal Husbandry and Dairying confirmed that camel and donkey are the only two species showing a consistent declining trend across the last four livestock censuses. The mithun, on the other hand, showed a 29.5 percent increase between 2012 and 2019, reaching 3.8 lakh animals – a continuation of the positive trend seen since the late 1990s. The yak bucked its earlier growth to decline by nearly 25 percent in the same period, underscoring how climate change and border restrictions have begun to undermine what was once a stable highland livestock system.

Each of these animals is a repository of genetic diversity fine-tuned to its specific environment over thousands of years of domestication. The camel is adapted to extreme aridity; the yak to extreme cold and hypoxia; the mithun to tropical highland forests. Losing any of them would mean losing not just livestock breeds, but entire knowledge systems, cultural traditions, and ecological services tied to the landscapes they inhabit. Breed conservation programmes, grazing rights protection, market development for their products – milk, meat, fibre, and leather – and transboundary cooperation (particularly for yaks across the Himalayan region) are all critical to ensuring these populations do not continue to decline.

What do you think? Given that the camel’s decline is closely tied to the loss of its traditional working roles, should India’s conservation efforts focus more on creating new economic uses for camels – such as camel milk production – rather than restricting their trade? And with the mithun’s population growth driven largely by its cultural importance to tribal communities, how can formal meat markets and commercial development be introduced without weakening the very cultural bonds that have kept this species thriving?

References

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Table of Contents

The camel: a declining “ship of the desert” 🔗

Why utility collapse drove the numbers down 🔗

Habitat challenges and the shrinking pastoral landscape 🔗

The yak: the highland lifeline 🔗

Factors behind yak population growth in the early 2000s 🔗

Challenges that followed: a reversal in recent decades 🔗

The mithun: the “cattle of the mountains” 🔗

Cultural significance: more than livestock 🔗

Mithun as a meat and production animal 🔗

Comparing the three: utility, habitat, and cultural value 🔗

Conservation status and the road ahead 🔗