Higher food prices here to stay: analysts

Paul Handley Yahoo News 6 Feb 11;

WASHINGTON (AFP) – From McDonald's burgers in the United States to sugar in Bolivia and chilis in Indonesia, food prices across the globe are soaring.

But consumers and governments should brace themselves for even higher prices, experts warn, as demand in populous emerging economies will put pressure on supplies for years to come.

A "perfect storm" of bad weather, rapid growth in emerging economies -- with people eating more higher-value, resource-intense food -- and low interest rates has sent prices for a broad range of farm and non-farm commodities climbing often at double-digit rates: from wheat to corn, cotton to rubber, and oil to boot.

And while it resembles the sharp spike in food and oil prices of 2007-2008, analysts say the current trend is less speculative in nature and not likely to end with a price collapse, as it did two years ago.

"Things were quite different in 2008... You had price spikes, it was a couple of food grains," said Chris Delgado, an agriculture specialist at the World Bank.

"What is going on now is more broadbased... It's not led by grains."

And it's widespread, and feeding into political worries, not just in the Middle East.

In Indonesia, where even the price of chilis has soared, the government suspended import duties on key food items after inflation hit an annual rate of seven percent in January.

In Bolivia, sugar is being rationed despite a 64 percent price hike.

In the United States, much higher meat prices are forcing restaurants from fancy steak houses to McDonald's to hike their prices, even though the pocketbooks of consumers remain tight.

On Thursday, the UN Food and Agriculture Organization said food prices have reached their highest level since it began measuring them in 1990, and pointed to the political problems that can spark.

"Not only is there a risk, but there have already been riots in some parts of the world because of rising prices," FOA chief Jacques Diouf said.

There is little relief in sight, say experts.

"I think commodity prices are going to be trending higher," said Gerard Lyons, chief economist for Standard Chartered Bank.

"What's interesting is that even commodities that aren't heavily traded are rising in price. ... That suggests this is fundamental, not speculators," he told AFP.

The 2008 commodity spike was only a handful of food grains plus oil, and driven in large part by political decisions amounting to hoarding and heavy trader speculation.

This year the problem is more fundamental: prices are being driven by growing demand from huge emerging economies like China, India, Russia and Brazil that is unlikely to slacken until prices get much higher, say analysts.

The World Bank's Delgado said that supply shocks are exacerbating the price hikes: weather and policy moves that have cut grain supplies from Russia, Argentina and Australia, among others.

But the trend is rooted in the fundamentals of soaring demand, say economists.

"More and more people are moving up the scale of income, so they tend to have higher value food," said Nariman Behravesh, chief economist at IHS Global Insight.

Lyons said there is not much relief on the horizon because of the time it takes farmers to expand acreage and production.

"It takes a long time, two to three years, for new supply to come on stream," Lyons said.

"I think commodity prices are going to be trending higher."

Commodity traders are saying the same thing.

Last week Morgan Stanley commodities specialist Hussein Allidina said key items like corn, soybeans and wheat still face strong upward price pressure -- with corn possibly going up another 20 percent from the current level of $6.60 a bushel before demand weakens.

"We see record tightness across the agriculture complex and believe that higher prices will be necessary to ration demand and incentivize acreage," he said in a report.

Behravesh said he thinks the problem is mainly a short-term one, more like 2008, and have limited economic impact overall.

But policy-wise, he said governments don't have many tools to bring down the cost of food and other commodities, especially if they are import-dependent.

Aside from pushing up interest rates to slow growth, said Behravesh, "There's not much central bankers can do about food prices."

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Asia faces climate-induced migration 'crisis'

Martin Abbugao Yahoo News 5 Feb 11;

SINGAPORE (AFP) – Asia must prepare for millions of people to flee their homes to safer havens within countries and across borders as weather patterns become more extreme, the Asian Development Bank warns.

A draft of an ADB report obtained by AFP over the weekend and confirmed by bank officials cautioned that failure to make preparations now for vast movements of people could lead to "humanitarian crises" in the coming decades.

Governments are currently focused on mitigating climate change blamed for the weather changes, but the report said they should start laying down policies and mechanisms to deal with the projected population shifts.

"What is clear is that Asia and the Pacific will be amongst the global regions most affected by the impacts of climate change," said the report entitled "Climate Change and Migration in Asia and the Pacific".

"Such impacts include significant temperature increases, changing rainfall patterns, greater monsoon variability, sea-level rise, floods and more intense tropical cyclones," it said.

The report, expected to be released in the next few weeks, comes as flooding overwhelms parts of Asia-Pacific, most recently in Australia, where a powerful cyclone worsened the impact of weeks of record inundations.

"Asia and the Pacific is particularly vulnerable because of its high degree of exposure to environmental risks and high population density. As a result, it could experience population displacements of unprecedented scale in the next decades," said the report, primarily targeted at regional policymakers.

Research carried out for the United Nations showed that 2010 was one of the worst years on record worldwide for natural disasters.

Asians accounted for 89 percent of the 207 million people affected by disasters globally last year, according to the Belgium-based Centre for Research on the Epidemiology of Disasters (CRED).

Summer floods and landslides in China caused an estimated $18 billion dollars in damage, while floods in Pakistan cost $9.5 billion dollars, CRED's annual study showed. Not to mention the catastrophic human cost.

"Governments are not prepared and that is why ADB is conducting this project," said Bart Edes, director of the Manila-based lending institution's poverty reduction, gender and social development division.

"There is no international cooperation mechanism established to manage climate-induced migration. Protection and assistance schemes to help manage that flow is opaque, poorly coordinated and scattered," he told AFP.

"Policymakers need to take action now," he stressed, noting that negotiating treaties and efforts to raise funds takes time.

Last year's natural disasters in the Asia-Pacific, including millions of people displaced in Sri Lanka and the Philippines, "give us a flavour of what to expect in the future", said Edes.

"Migration in general is not being properly addressed and the situation is going be made worse," added Edes, referring to the additional impact of climate change on migration patterns, fuelled by economic needs and armed conflicts.

"Now we have another driver of migration."

The draft ADB report said the people forced to leave due to the extreme weather changes "have come to incarnate the human face of climate change" and while many of them will return home, many will be displaced permanently.

Those expected to suffer the most will be the poor as they lack the means to easily pack up and leave for safer havens, the report said.

"The issue of climate-induced migration will grow in magnitude and will take different forms," the report added, urging national governments and the global community to "urgently address this issue in a proactive manner."

"Failure to do so could result in humanitarian crises with great social and economic costs," it warned.

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Could carbon markets become obsolete?

Esther Ng Today Online 7 Feb 11;

SINGAPORE - It should be a happy headache for environmentalists. Yet the possibility of carbon markets becoming obsolete within the next one or two decades - as industralised countries cut their carbon emissions - could have dire consequences, according to three researchers.

Currently, carbon markets provide a rich source of funding for United Nations-backed conservation scheme REDD+. The idea is for industrialised countries to offset their own emissions by buying carbon credits from developing countries, thereby giving communities in the latter group an incentive to protect their forests and preserve endangered species.

More than just preventing deforestation and forest degradation, REDD+ also includes the possibility of offsetting emissions through "sustainable forest management", "conservation" and "increasing forest carbon stocks".

But in a paper recently published in a journal of the Society for Conservation Biology, Assistant Professor Edward Webb and PhD student Jacob Phelps from the National University of Singapore and research fellow Koh Lian Pin from Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH Zurich), pointed out that REDD+ was designed to buy time for developed countries to come up with new low-carbon technologies.

However, Mr Vinod Kesava, managing director of carbon consulting firm Climate Resources Exchange, disagreed that carbon markets could become obsolete in two decades.

He said: "Carbon sequestration, renewable energy and energy efficiency in themselves are inherently the foundation of carbon markets, because had there been no action taken to invest in the R&D for such technologies and specific methods to validate and monitor them, more carbon emission would have been produced otherwise."

Environmental group Conservation International (CI) told MediaCorp that it estimates that $12 billion to $35 billion annually is needed to make significant gains in reducing emissions from deforestation.

In response to the researchers' paper, CI reiterated that public funding will need to remain a major source of finance for REDD+. However, it noted that the scheme could turn to alternative sources of financing.

For instance, the scheme could allow the private sector - instead of governments - to offset carbon emissions by financing actions to reduce emissions in developing countries.

Other innovative sources of financing, not just for REDD+, but also for other mitigation and adaptation actions in developing countries should also be considered, CI added. For example, taxes on international maritime and aviation transport could provide significant, sustainable and predictable sources of funds. ESTHER NG

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Best of our wild blogs: 6 Feb 11

Our Forests in February!
from Celebrating Singapore's BioDiversity!

Life History of the Harlequin
from Butterflies of Singapore

Day 1 of Year of the Rabbit @ BSP
from Beauty of Fauna and Flora in Nature

Kranji mangroves: cool spiders and colourful crabs
from wild shores of singapore

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Wetland planting at Alexandra Canal

Alvina Soh Channel NewsAsia 5 Feb 11;

Students from Crescent Girls School and CHIJ Kellock Primary School got together to do some wetland planting at Alexandra Canal

SINGAPORE: The community got together to do some wetland planting at Alexandra Canal on January 7 as part of the Active, Beautiful and Clean (ABC) Waters Programme.

The initiative is aimed at giving the canal a makeover and be a recreational destination for the public.

Students from Crescent Girls School and CHIJ Kellock Primary School got their hands dirty for a good cause.

They were busy planting the wetlands along a 1.2 kilometre stretch of the Alexandra Canal - from Tanglin Road to Delta Road.

And it was a memorable experience for them.

"I feel really good because its like I'm giving back to society. I'm playing my part for the rest of the students, the people who live here, and the residents, so it feels very satisfying," said Lim Fang Yi, a student from Crescent Girls School.

Another student, Ayisha Fathima also from Crescent Girls School, said: "I am extremely excited and happy because it's a great opportunity for me to learn my favourite subjects, chemistry, biology and geography outside the classroom."

Various organisations also got into the act to beautify the place.

Mas Shafreen, Manager, 3P Network, PUB, said: "[It is] not just about providing engineering infrastructure, beautiful spaces, but its all about getting the community involved.

"So you're looking at secondary school students interacting with primary school students, interacting with government organisations as well as private sector organisations, so the takeaway is not just for the students."

National water agency PUB said the project is aimed at inculcating a sense of ownership in the Canal.

"After a few months, I'd like to come back here and see the fruits of our hard work," said Nabiha Safudi, a student from Crescent Girls School.

More facilities such as a lookout deck at Tanglin, a shallow water play area and an educational hut are planned for the area.

- CNA/fa

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Keeping pests under control

Midges, cockroaches, rodents, pigeons and crows can be eradicated if they are deprived of food sources
Rachael Boon Straits Times 6 Feb 11;

Tiny green and black flies, known as chironomid midges, are no longer engulfing the open areas and homes of residents in Bedok Reservoir Road, thanks to the combined efforts of Aljunied Town Council, National Parks Board, Public Utilities Board (PUB) and National Environment Agency (NEA).

In separate tests run by PUB and NEA, the population of midge eggs and larvae there has fallen by 95 per cent.

That was the latest infestation to hit Singapore. Through the years, other pests such as cockroaches, rodents, mosquitoes and pigeons have caused Singaporeans much headache.

Account executive K.L. Tan was plagued by pigeons for more than 10 years at her private apartment in Tanglin, until anti- roosting spikes were installed on her window ledge last year.

The 24-year-old says: 'The pigeons liked to rest there and they pooped a lot. I used to have an old window aircon unit and they stuffed twigs into whatever space they could find. It was their nesting area.'

More annoying, and worrying, were their droppings as it was unhygienic.

The pigeons were a nuisance so Ms Tan and her neighbours informed the estate management. It took a while for the spikes to be installed as the management had to find suitable timings for apartment owners to be home for the installation.

The management previously tried to arrange for the shooting of the pigeons but as the apartments were close to the Botanic Gardens, the shooting was called off.

The reasons for different kinds of pest infestations vary but one common cause is the availability of food and nesting opportunities.

A spokesman for the Agri-Food and Veterinary Authority (AVA) says it is impossible to rid an area completely of pigeons, as they are free-roaming birds and can travel to occupy any free area.

Also, birds and all animals are likely to congregate where food and shelter are abundant and easily accessible.

The AVA says: 'Members of the public facing bird nuisance may apply control measures such as using repellents, eliminating food sources and roosting or nesting opportunities that attract birds to congregate, or engage pest control services to mitigate the nuisance.'

In any case, public feeding of pigeons is prohibited. Anyone caught feeding stray pigeons in public places can be fined up to $500.

Another pesky creature is the Norway rat. This species makes up 90 per cent of the rodents in Singapore, according to a survey done by NEA.

The environment agency found that some of the root causes of infestations include poor refuse management of premises and bin centres, as refuse provides rats with food; improper storage of food; and poor housekeeping practices in shops, markets and food centres.

What happens when the rats are already a problem? An NEA spokesman says: 'Our officers would look for signs of rat activity or harbourage in affected areas. This

includes rat burrows, runways or paths the rats take, droppings and gnaw marks.

'Detected burrows will be treated with rodenticide and sealed after no further activity is detected. Our officers will also try to establish the root cause of the rat activities so that it can be addressed.'

Mr Thomas Fernandez, chairman and chief executive officer of pest control company PestBusters, says it can take up to six weeks to make a place as large as a shopping centre free of rats.

He says: 'You have to put in control measures and understand the biology of rats. For example, they eat 10 per cent of their body weight and are usually territorial as they want to keep the family together. You cannot just put one rat trap out for a family of 10, you must know how many families there are within a 30m radius.

'After measures are taken and the area appears rat-free, we still have to monitor the area by putting out food to lure any hidden rats. The situation has to be monitored continually.'

Pestbuster Rentokil Initial Singapore, which was recently involved in the spraying of insecticide on the walls of HDB blocks in Bedok Reservoir Road to eliminate the midges, says the public should be aware that pests do return after a while as they are masters in survival. Some species of cockroaches are believed to be millions of years old, after all.

Rentokil technical manager Lim Min Hui says: 'Regular detection and vigilant monitoring is necessary to ensure pest infestation is under control.

'Pest infestation may cause damages and risks if left untreated, such as insecure infrastructure, damaged properties, spreading of diseases, bites and allergies, and potential electrical short circuits which may lead to a fire.'

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Spooked on Pulau Ubin

Joel Cooper Straits Times 6 Feb 11;

I have always prided myself on my refusal to believe in ghosts. Spine-chilling tales of spectres, spirits and bogeymen leave me totally unmoved.

My wife, however, is a different story. She won't watch spooky movies and sometimes even leaves the bedside lamp on to ward off things that go bump in the night.

This has caused some tension - especially as I'm a fan of films like The Exorcist and can't get to sleep unless it is completely dark.

But when we took a three-night break to Pulau Ubin, we found ourselves, for once, on exactly the same page.

It was already quite late when we arrived on the island and its ubiquitous bicycle hire shops were closing. We wanted to explore anyway, so we set off on foot along one of the many deserted roads through the forest.

As the shadows lengthened, the jungle seemed to come alive with unfamiliar and threatening noises. There is something about the twilight hour that can bring out a primal fear in even the hardiest of sceptics. In my native Britain, it is traditionally considered the time when vampires and werewolves emerge from their lairs to stalk the earth.

What we hadn't realised is that in equatorial Singapore, the sun sets far quicker than in our northern homeland, which we left four months ago to work at The Straits Times.

Before we knew it, it was nearly dark and we found ourselves still a long way from the resort where we were staying. Despite my determination to remain sceptical about the supernatural, I was starting to feel more than a little creeped out. Behind every twisted trunk I imagined some malign presence lurking, ready to pounce and devour us.

Without uttering a word, my wife and I began walking quicker and quicker until we were practically running through the forest in the direction of home, our nerves jangling at every little movement in the trees.

Without warning, a shadowy creature burst from the bushes. I let out an effeminate shriek and grabbed hold of my wife's arm for dear life.

The creature turned menacingly to face us. It had sharp-looking teeth and a bristling tail. It was about the size of a dog.

Hang on! It was a dog.

I carried on walking with my tail between my legs, feeling more than a little silly.

After that, I endured non-stop ribbing from my wife. 'Who's the coward now?' she teased.

Thankfully, my colleagues on The Straits Times news desk reassured me that I was far from the first person to get spooked on Pulau Ubin. They regaled me with hair-raising tales, including one about the Hantu Tetek, a voluptuous female ghost who sneaks into men's bedrooms at night and smothers them with her ample charms. To be honest, my wife was a bit more concerned about this one than I was.

Fleeing Ubin by boat won't keep you safe either, I was told. Apparently the ghosts are into island hopping.

Even gaudy Sentosa - where the only place you would expect to feel scared is on a roller coaster - has more than its fair share of spooky stories.

When night falls and the noise and bustle of the amusement parks fade to just a memory, holidaymakers staying in chalets have reported hearing fingernails scratching at the windowpane as if someone, or something, wants to get in.

Nobody can deny that the urban jungle makes a great setting for blood-curdling tales of the supernatural. During my four years working for The Sun based in East London, I would sometimes trudge home in the small hours through a grimy street said to be visited by the gory spectre of one of Jack the Ripper's butchered victims.

Yet it is brooding, untamed forests like Pulau Ubin's that truly allow our imaginations to run riot.

Cycling along the island's twisting tree-lined trails brought childhood memories flooding back of exhilarating afternoons spent mountain-biking with my friends near the village where I grew up in Surrey, south-east England. They say that area is stalked by the headless ghost of Sir Thomas More, who was decapitated by King Henry VIII.

Sometimes my friends and I would camp out in a back garden in tents or bivouac shelters built from branches.

Huddled inside our flimsy sleeping bags, we did our best to chill one another to the core with tales of murders, of unexplained accidents and of the restless souls they left behind.

Despite our boyish bravado, as the eerie glow of torchlight transformed our faces into hideous gargoyles these stories seemed to take on a terrifying plausibility.

I never really believed a word of them, of course. Still, I always steered clear of the woods at night. Well you can never be too careful, can you?

The writer, from England, is a Straits Times copy editor. He has lived in Singapore for four months.

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Sea turtle nests on decline along the Andaman Sea

Bangkok Post 6 Feb 11;

The number of sea turtle nests along the Andaman Sea coast had declined this egg-laying season because of a more volatile climate, a marine expert says.

Kongkiet Kittiwattanawong, a researcher at the Phuket Marine Biological Centre of the Department of Marine and Coastal Resources, said yesterday a survey conducted by the centre found the number of turtle nests on the Andaman coast had decreased from 50 in recent years to only 40 this year.

He said the turtles had probably stopped coming to the nesting grounds due to the effects of global warming.

Their breeding season runs from November until March. The turtles look for a quiet environment with an ideal temperature of about 29 degrees Celsius to lay eggs. However, temperatures in the nesting areas this season have been above and below 29 degrees.

Mr Kongkiet said hundreds of leatherback turtles started laying eggs on Mai Khao beach in Phuket 20 years ago, but this year only one nest was found on the beach.

Thailand is home to four endangered species of sea turtle: the Leatherback, Olive Ridley, Green and Hawksbill.

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Illegal timber sold by British businesses putting world's forests at risk

Reluctance by UK firms to check source of imported wood contributing to devastating deforestation around the world, finds WWF report
Tracy McVeigh guardian.co.uk 5 Feb 11;

British firms are still selling wood products that come from questionable sources in parts of the world where illegal logging is having a devastating effect, a new study has revealed.

The report found that wood used in kitchen worktops, doors and decking, on sale in the UK, comes from parts of Indonesia, Malaysia and the Congo Basin where illegal felling is putting animals, plants and people under threat. Numerous species, including the orangutan, are under direct threat of extinction because of the black market trade in timber.

The "What Wood You Choose?" study suggested British businesses aren't checking their sources and in some cases are even misleading the public that the wood they are selling has ethical credentials where none exist.

New EU timber laws are due to come into force next year, but this WWF-funded study shows few retailers are prepared for the legislation which could leave them open to conviction. The study found that in some cases companies had little idea where their wood products originated from and were reluctant to find out.

It also found that some companies' websites were misusing the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) logo, implying that all their products are covered by the certification scheme when in fact only some are. WWF used a combination of formal requests, investigators posing as buyers and made phone calls and visits to sawmills in Indonesia and Malaysia to track timber products.

Colin Butfield, WWF's head of campaigns, said: "This study should act as a wake-up call to companies here in the UK. Consumers are the ones with the power to demand that whatever they're buying, from doors to kitchen worktops, is FSC [certified]. If it doesn't have the FSC logo then it could originate from a place where there have been devastating impacts on species, such as the orangutan, and communities that earn a living from the forest.

"The EU law, coming into force in early 2013, will mean anyone intending to sell timber products into the UK market will have to show where it's come from and that it isn't illegal. The study suggests that UK businesses are a long way from meeting the demands of that new law."

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Best of our wild blogs: 5 Feb 11

CNY nature walk at Chek Jawa Boardwalk - 12 Feb 2011
from Adventures with the Naked Hermit Crabs

Vulturine Guineafowl spotted in Singapore
from Bird Ecology Study Group

Myrialepis paradoxa: Paradoxically Yours
from Flying Fish Friends

Little Sisters Island
from Singapore Nature and wonderful creations and wild shores of singapore

Museum Hopping for Bunnies
from My Itchy Fingers

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That predatory hunger for shark's fin

Imports of delicacy nearly doubled since 2003 despite campaigns
Lester Kok & Grace Chua Straits Times 5 Feb 11;

EVERY Chinese New Year, campaigns by conservation groups ask diners to stop eating shark's fin.

But recent figures show that Singapore's imports of the delicacy have nearly doubled since 2003. The Agri-Food and Veterinary Authority (AVA), which supplied the numbers, said nearly 2,500 tonnes were imported last year, up from 1,300 tonnes eight years ago.

The figures include dried, salted and canned fins, and refer to those meant for both domestic consumption and export.

And last week, conservation group Traffic delivered more alarming news: a report that a decade-long United Nations shark conservation scheme has failed.

Shark's fin importers here say that demand is rebounding, after a small dip due to 2009's economic crisis.

The price of shark's fin goes up 10 to 15 per cent a year, but demand is rising even quicker thanks to growing affluence in East Asia.

Mr Melvin Foo, managing director of seafood importer and exporter Sineurope, explained that 95 per cent of what he imports goes to places like Japan and China. Just two to three tonnes, or less than 5 per cent of his imports, are sold here.

All imports of sharks and shark's fin are regulated through an AVA licensing scheme. According to Mr Foo, shark's fins sold here must be landed along with the body of the shark, to prevent a practice known as live shark finning, where fishermen slice the fin off the fish and dump it back into the water. And, he says, demand for shark meat actually comes from Europe, where it is more valued and fins are considered waste.

The World Wide Fund For Nature (WWF) wildlife conservation group would prefer sharks not to be eaten at all. In its Singapore Seafood Guide published in February last year, WWF Singapore advised people to choose seafood from sustainable sources and to avoid all shark products.

Its website, www.wwf.sg, states it is not aware of any shark fisheries that are sustainably managed.

A Singapore-tailored online campaign was also launched by the group last week: the 'Say No to Shark Fin' pledge.

Sharks are typically either caught deliberately or as accidental bycatch.

When overfished, their populations are slow to recover as they take a long time to reproduce and mature. And according to the International Union for Conservation of Nature's Red List of endangered species, six species of shark are considered critically endangered, meaning their populations have declined by as much as 90 per cent in the past couple of decades.

But campaigns here are soldiering on.

The latest, by Project: FIN on social networking site Facebook, asks people to change their profile pictures to an image which reads: Celebrate Chinese New Year with no shark's fin soup.

A year ago, the WWF launched its Sustainable Seafood Guide for Singapore, in which it noted that most shark fisheries were unregulated and many species were overfished.

And posts on government feedback site Reach have asked for all government functions not to serve shark's fin.

Already, some hotels like those at Resorts World Sentosa do not serve the dish. The Fairmont Singapore has removed not only shark's fin, but also Chilean sea bass and bluefin tuna - which are also overfished - from its menu.

Other hotels like the Marriott are moving away from it. A spokesman said: 'We have made a conscious decision to substantially reduce the number of shark's fin dishes available on our a la carte menu.'

But the Marriott continues to serve shark's fin when guests ask for it, out of respect for local culture and guest preferences, she added.

Still, hotels like the Marriott and Mandarin Orchard say more couples are asking for shark's fin alternatives for their wedding banquets.

WWF Singapore's managing director, Ms Amy Ho, said the practice of eating shark's fin will stop only when the customers choose to stop.

She said sharks play an important role as top predators in the marine ecosystem, adding: 'All these ecosystems are very important to preserve nature for future generations to come.'

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Study launched to preserve animals in Kinabatangan area

New Straits Times 4 Feb 11;

KINABATANGAN: A recently launched Kinabatangan Carnivore Programme aims to study animals more closely to ensure their conservation.

Sabah Wildlife Department director Dr Laurentius Ambu said the programme initiated by the department intended to advance understanding and conservation of the diverse carnivores of the Lower Kinabatangan floodplain.

Launched by the department, Danau Girang Field Centre (DGFC), a non-governmental organisation Hutan and WildCRU, the programme is funded by four American zoos -- Houston, Columbus, Cincinnati and Phoenix -- and private donors in New York.


"We are collaborating with Andrew Hearn from WildCRU (University of Oxford, United Kingdom) who spent the last four years studying clouded leopards and other carnivores in Danum Valley and Tabin Wildlife Reserve. His experience with camera trapping is primordial for the success of this project," said Ambu.

DGFC director Dr Benoit Goossens said it would be a long-term programme to provide insight into Bornean carnivore ecology and density and develop Bornean carnivore species distribution and habitat suitability models.

Two undergraduates from Cardiff University Rob Colgan and Rodi Tenquist said last November they found a sequence of 12 pictures showing a clouded leopard female and her cub walking along a trail.


"Our preliminary data show that carnivores are still present in the Kinabatangan floodplain. However forest fragmentation and habitat destruction result in their decline. The pictures show that these animals rely on forest corridors for moving around forest patches," they said.

Hutan co-director Dr Marc Acrenaz said like other species such as orang utans, gibbons, proboscis monkeys and elephants, carnivores needed corridors of forest for surviving in the Kinabatangan.

"Without these corridors, most populations will decline and go extinct."

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