Tunggadewa Mattangkilang Jakarta Globe 24 Mar 14;
Balikpapan. Ten orangutans have been released back into the wild in East Kalimantan after recovery in the Samboja Lestari rehabilitation center.
The six female and four male orangutans were set free in the Kehjesewen conservation forest in the East Kutai district of East Kalimantan on Thursday by the Borneo Orangutan Survival Foundation (Yayasan BOS).
“In 2014 we began our program by releasing 10 orangutans back into the wild. We are optimistic that we will be able to release more orangutans into their natural habitat — but this has to be supported by the existence of quality, safe forests,” said Samboja Lestari program manager Agus Irwanto.
Agus said the BOS was committed to achieving the release target set up in the Indonesian Orangutan Conservation Action Plan for 2007-2017, announced by President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono during the climate change conference in Bali in 2007. The plan calls for all orangutans in rehabilitation centers to be released back into their natural habitats by 2015.
Agus said that so far the BOS had released 31 orangutans back into natural forests. But more orangutans could be released if deforestation was halted, he said.
“We really hope that all stakeholders will support [orangutan] release by ensuring the provision of decent and safe forests in the future,” he said.
Agus said orangutans were facing extinction in the wild because of fast-paced deforestation driven largely by clearing for oil palm and pulp and paper plantations, most of which are owned by large conglomerates rather than local farmers.
Wildlife experts warn that shrinking habitats have increased contact between the forest-dwelling orangutans and villagers and is the primary cause of an upswing in human-on-animal violence in Kalimantan and Sumatra.
Authorities have recorded a disturbing number of cases of people killing the endangered creatures, both deliberately and incidentally by felling and burning the forests they live in.
Examples include a female orangutan that died in 2010 in Pontianak’s Sungai Pinyuh subdistrict after being captured by villagers with her baby, and another orangutan killed in 2012 near Pontianak’s Parit Wak Dongkak subdistrict after sustaining serious burns in a fire lit for land clearance. The animal died while being treated for its injuries.
In October last year, an orangutan was found dead in Pontianak’s Peniraman village, with its skull reportedly bashed in.
One of the most biodiverse countries, Indonesia has seen huge swaths of forest cut down for timber and agribusiness. The country was home to nearly half of the world’s oil palm plantations in 2006 after years of concession land grabs, illegal logging and lax law enforcement, according to the World Wide Fund for Nature.
Palm oil is the world’s most ubiquitous vegetable oil and a main driver of deforestation in Indonesia.
