Indonesian Fires and Loggers Threaten Orangutans

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PANGKALAN BUN, Indonesia, September 27, 2002

(Environment News Service) - Thick haze has covered

many parts of Kalimantan, Sumatra, and North Maluku

this week, prompting schools to close down and people

to stay at home. The haze is created by fires

smouldering across these islands due to drought,

lightning and fires set for land clearance that get

out of control.

 

Palangkaraya Mayor Salundik Goyong Wednesday ordered

all schools to close until further notice. He said the

closure was ordered because of the health hazard

caused by the thick haze that has blanketed the area

for weeks. On Thursday the haze, caused by smoke from

burning forests and peat, had reduced visibility in

Palangkaraya to around 10 meters (33 feet).

 

In August, the Kalimantan government put together a

team of 370 forest rangers, police and soldiers, to

try to put out the fires, without much success.

Authorities can only hope for rain, which is not

forecast until October.

 

Orangutan expert Dr. Biruté Galdikas says a fire

several weeks ago advanced quickly on the Orangutan

Foundation International's new Care Center facility in

the village of Pasir Panjang, a suburb of the city of

Pangkalan Bun. If not for the quick work of the

center's staff, the facility and the orangutans could

have been damaged or destroyed.

 

Many fires have been burning underground for months.

Suwido Limin at the Kalimantan Centre for

International Cooperation in Management of Tropical

Peatland began in late July to battle a fire started

in the Natural Laboratory for Management of Peat Swamp

Forest where his team has been recording biodiversity

and natural resource functions of this threatened

ecosystem for the last 10 years.

 

Limin says, " This area is also home to the largest

remaining orangutan population in the world. Its

survival is also threatened, and up to 5,000 animals

could die if these fires gain a firm hold. " So far,

Limin's team including a group of 17 young volunteers

from the United Kingdom who are living and working at

the center, have managed to hold off the fires.

 

More serious, says Dr. Galdikas, is the problem of

illegal logging near the foundation's Camp Leakey

orangutan research facility. " Illegal loggers are

coming in from another river system and spending many

days going through swamps to reach the eastern border

of the study area. They are carving out small canals

and building wooden rails to float and drag logs out

later this year when the rains come. We hear their

chainsaws, and are fearful they will begin cutting

down the fruit trees for the orangutans in the study

area. "

 

Located in the Tanjung Puting Reserve in Central

Kalimantan, Camp Leakey was established in 1971 by Dr.

Biruté Galdikas. It was named after anthropologist

Louis Leakey, who was a mentor to Dr. Galdikas as well

as Drs. Jane Goodall and Dian Fossey. Originally

consisting of two huts, Camp Leakey is now a cluster

of permanent wooden structures that provides a base

for scientists, staff, students, and guards.

 

" We are mounting police patrols, " Dr. Galdikas says,

" but the loggers are not always easy to find. Even

when the police encounter the loggers, they are only

told to leave - they are not forced to leave. After

being give a couple of chances, then the police can be

more forceful. This takes time and frankly time is

running out. We know these people have used machetes

to kill orangutans, like Davida, and we do not want

anything to happen to the many orangutans we know that

live in the study area like Princess, Peta, Unyuk,

Tutut, Tom, and so many others. "

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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