Nature Alert: Thousands of Orangutans in Central Kalimantan in danger

Sunday 26 July 2009

Thousands of Orangutans in Central Kalimantan in danger

Personal note: Such publicity is always helful. For all its size and staff employed, I have still never once met anyone from WWF in the field or forest. Long time readers of my blog will know my views of WWF.

WWF failed the tigers (now only about 1000 left in the wild) and I can't see it saving any orangutans. Compared to say COP, how often have you seen WWF actually doing anything worthwhile to save orangutans?

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The Jakarta Post , Jakarta | Sun, 07/26/2009

The good news is that there are between 6,000 and 9,000 Orangutans still living in Central Kalimantan forests, but the bad news is that their lives are in danger.

Head of the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF)'s Central Kalimantan project, Rosenda CH Hasih, told Antara on Sunday that that the Orangutans currently living in Sebangau national parks in Central Kalimantan were saved by the failure of the one million hectare peat land rice project in Kalimantan.

Rosenda noted that currently the habitats of Orangutans were in danger from illegal logging as well as from illegal hunting.

"WWF together with Sebangau national parks are now conserving the Orangutan, both by protecting its habitats and improving the welfare of people living around the parks," Rosenda said.

Rosenda added that improving the welfare of local people is important as they live from the forests, either by collecting rattan or certain kinds of woods from the forests or collecting fish from rivers in the forests.

http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2009/07/26/thousands-orangutans-central-kalimantan-danger.html

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.