Nature Alert: Lush supports jungle tribe under threat

Tuesday 21 July 2009

Lush supports jungle tribe under threat

Published Date: 21 July 2009

A LEADING retailer has created a "living petition" in its Princes Street shop window to help raise awareness of an under-threat jungle tribe.

Cosmetics firm Lush wants shoppers to have their photograph taken next to a giant cardboard tree in the store's window.

The campaign hopes to highlight the plight of Indonesia's Orang Rimba people, who Lush says are under threat from firms chopping down their jungle homes for palm oil plantations.

The petition, organised in conjunction with Greenpeace, will be presented to palm oil and paper company Sinar Mas.

Andrew Butler, Lush's campaigns manager, said: "Last year I spent time in Sumatran forests talking to members of the Orang Rimba tribe, who have seen their forest homes destroyed to make way for palm oil plantations.

"They are asking for the help of people in the UK to save their homes and way of life – it is up to all of us to stop companies like Sinar Mas who are intent on cutting down forests to produce paper and palm oil."

Greenpeace forest campaigner Ian Duff added: "When Sinar Mas clear forest and peatland for new palm oil plantations they release thousands of tonnes of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere.

"Sinar Mas must hear the calls of Lush and its customers and halt further destruction of forest and peatland for palm oil."

The full article contains 229 words and appears in Edinburgh Evening News newspaper.

Last Updated: 21 July 2009 9:25 AM
Source: Edinburgh Evening News
Location: Edinburgh

http://news.scotsman.com/scotland/Lush-supports-jungle-tribe-under.5477664.jp

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.