Nature Alert: Firm Action Awaits Sungai Segaliud Polluters

Tuesday, 10 November 2009

Firm Action Awaits Sungai Segaliud Polluters

November 10, 2009 19:28 PM

Firm Action Awaits Sungai Segaliud Polluters

SANDAKAN, Nov 10 (Bernama) -- The Tourism, Culture and Environment Ministry will take action against three palm oil factories in the district which are found to have polluted the Sungai Segaliud.

Minister Datuk Masidi Manjun said that although the palm oil industry was important to the state, palm oil companies should give priority to the effort to conserve the environment and not just to rake in profit.

Speaking to reporters after visiting the Segaliud water treatment plant here, he said samples taken from the river last month showed that the water was polluted by waste discharged by palm oil factories nearby.

He said that one of the factories was found to be negligent for leaving the holding pond for palm oil effluent unattended, causing the content to spill into the river during rain and flood.

On the Sungai Segaliud water quality, Masidi said it was still safe for consumption.

-- BERNAMA

http://www.bernama.com/bernama/v5/newsindex.php?id=454111

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.