Nature Alert: Siz Sumatran Orangutans to Be Released Into Jambi National Park

Monday 18 February 2008

Siz Sumatran Orangutans to Be Released Into Jambi National Park

Six Sumatra Orang-Utans to Be Released Into Jambi National Park

Source: Antara News - February 17, 2008

Jambi: Six Sumatra orang-utans (Pongo pigmaeus abelii) from the Sumatra Orang-Utan Quarantine Center in Batu Mbelin Village, Sibolangit Subdistrict, Deli Serdang, North Sumatra province, were scheduled to arrive at Bukit Tiga Puluh National Park (TNBT) in Tebo Regency, Jambi, on February 19, 2008.

They are leaving North Sumatra for their destination by land on February 18, 2008, and were slated to arrive in Tebo regency on the following day, Head of the Jambi Province Natural Reserve Conservation Institute (BKSDA) Agung Setyabudi said in Jambi on Sunday.The government has turned the Jambi-Riau TNBT into a protection and breeding ground of the Sumatra orang-utan.

Previously the six orang-utans were quarantined for 20 months at the Sumatra Orang-Utan Quarantine Center of the North Sumatra Lestari Ecosystem Foundation (YEL).The six big apes as confiscated objects of the Nanggroe Aceh Darussalam (NAD) Natural Reserve Conservation Agency (BKSDA) are called Ahmad (13), Mopi and Deknong (8), Cut and Yanti (6), and Anjeli (5).

The six orang-utans will bring the total number of orang-utans set free into the Bukit Tiga Puluh National Park to 100.It was estimated that only 6,500 Sumatra orang-utans still survived today and are living in the Leuser exosystem area and in the Batangtoru protected forests in North Sumatra. (*)

Hall of Shame for President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono and the Palm Oil Industry.

Nothing can prepare one for the sight of the systematic extermination of orangutans by the government of Indonesia.

Look at the photos and news articles on these pages in the context of a statement the President made to the media on 10th December 2007.

“In the last 35 years about 50,000 orangutans are estimated to have been lost as their habitats shrank. If this continues, this majestic creature will likely face extinction by 2050,” President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono said at the launch of an orangutan conservation plan at the climate talks in Bali.

“The fate of the orangutan is a subject that goes to the heart of sustainable forests … To save the orangutan we have to save the forest.”

Statements like these are most welcome, but unless backed up by action, such words fall on deaf ears within the Ministry of Forestry....who are busy granting licences to cut down the very forests the President says they should protect!

When you think you are to busy to help, please could you reflect for a moment on .........

The following extract refers to environmental problems in general. I just hope you find it as thought provoking and relevant to orangutans as I have.

"This is such a shocking and unpalatable fact that most people deny it, or they just don't want to think about it. They believe as individuals, they can do little about it, so push it to the back of their minds. But I can't do that.

When something has to be done, we need to do it. It doesn't matter how big the challenge is or how hard the solution; if I know something is wrong, and I am in a position to help, I will do my best to make it right." Duncan Bannatyne, successful British businessman.