FERAL was involved in mapping fire-prone areas in Northern Orissa and assessing the extent to which these affected elephant crop raiding, and their conflict with humans. A preliminary conclusion is that repeated burning of forests for NTFP collection has resulted in almost no undergrowth in most of the sal forests observed. There is therefore no forage available for the elephants, and their use of the forest is limited to sheltering there during the day. Since the closest food resource in most cases are agricultural fields, they resort to crop raiding. We hope to validate this in the coming year.