Indonesia: Orangutan handed over to W. Kalimantan conservation agency

Severianus Endi The Jakarta Post 21 Sep 16;

A resident of Pontianak, West Kalimantan, voluntarily handed over a Kalimantan orangutan to the Natural Resources and Conservation Agency (BKSDA), the agency’s official has said.

BKSDA West Kalimantan head Sustyo Iriono said the local resident, M. Djafrie DA, reportedly found the orangutan in a hut belonging to an owner of a field in Landak regency in February, and raised it before he handed the rare species, which is endemic to Kalimantan Island, to his agency on Tuesday.

The female primate was in healthy condition and is predicted to be nine-months-old, he went on.

Sustyo further explained the orangutan had been immediately handled by the agency’s Wildlife and Plant Rescue team and was currently accommodated in a temporary cage at his office.

“We plan to entrust the orangutan to a shelter belonging to conservation group Yayasan Inisiasi Alam Rehabilitasi Indonesia [YIARI] in Ketapang regency so it can be rehabilitated,” he said.

Having started its operations in Ketapang since the end of 2009, YIARI has a shelter for the rehabilitation of orangutans. The shelter is supported by several veterinarians, clinics, cages and orangutan schools, where their wild characters can be recovered until they are ready to be released into their natural habitat.

Separately, YIARI director Karmele Liano Sanchez said the group’s shelter had rescued around 180 orangutans ranging from babies to adults. The animals were rehabilitated in the facility and around 60 individual orangutans have been released to their natural habitat in protected forests across West Kalimantan, she went on. (ebf)