Orangutan bashing: Indonesian activists attending to an injured Orangutan that was attacked by oil plantation workers residents in Sampit, Central Kalimantan in May.
Credit: Hardi Baktiantoro/AFP
JAKARTA: Workers on Indonesian palm oil plantations are deliberately killing endangered orangutans on Borneo to stop them eating their seedlings.
Hardi Baktiantoro, director of Indonesia's Centre for Orangutan Protection (COP), said at least 1,500 orangutans perished in 2006, most as a result of deliberate attacks but also due to their habitat disappearing to make way for palm oil plantations.
"Orangutans have become the victims of torture by plantation workers as they wander and eat palm oil seedlings for survival," Baktiantoro told reporters.
As plantation workers had to pay concession companies for the loss of the seedlings, they had no choice but to pursue the primates, he said.
"Victims of torture"
Video footage screened at a press briefing in Jakarta on Wednesday showed dead orangutans with severe head wounds allegedly inflicted by workers as well as severely injured animals that were treated by COP and other local rescue teams.
Baktiantoro said "even though this kind of cruelty violates Indonesia's law on biodiversity conservation, no one until now has been arrested for this crime."
The COP urged the Indonesian government to immediately cancel concessions to palm oil companies in a bid to protect the orangutans.
"Central Kalimantan is the final frontier of the orangutan population in Indonesia. If the forest clearing continues, we will soon lose our national treasure," he warned.
Scientists estimate that 34,000 orangutans remain in Central Kalimantan province on Borneo.
Indonesian vice president Jusuf Kalla has said that the southeast Asian nation plans to be the largest palm oil producer by 2008 amid strong demand from the global food, bio-fuel and chemicals industries.
Logging motive
Indonesia is currently the second largest producer after Malaysia although it has a much larger area for plantations. The two countries account for 85 per cent of world production.
A spokesman for the Indonesian Palm Oil Producers Association was not available for comment.
Environmentalists say an estimated 16.8 million hectares of forest have been cleared for palm oil plantations in Indonesia, but only 6.3 million hectares have actually been planted with the crop.
They allege permits to open new plantations are more often used as a pretext to clear land and sell the valuable logs.
Plam oil workers killing orangutans
There is nothing "green" about palm oil. These plantations are replacing the precious rain forests of these countries in Asia. This industry is wiping out the habitat of endangered animals who have a right to live there as they are the original inhabitants. The greed for power to replace fossil fuels is actually making global warming worse by taking our natural rainforests and killing other species that the whole eco-system depends on. What is bad for animals is bad ultimately for humans. These animals are intelligent and have indigenous rights to live there. The export of palm oil from all these countries should be BANNED. With rising human populations and the lack of fossil fuels, humans will become more greedy and violent and will continue to rape and kill to get cash for these supposedly "green" fuel alternatives. The only industry here should be sustainable usage of existing trees.
Palm oil workers killing orangutans
I agree with you completely. But after palm oil exports are banned, what do the local people do for a living? Hmmm?
A solution needs to be a complete fix, otherwise problems will just pop up in another form.
sustainable cottage industry
How did they live before the palm oil business? They lived as they always had - through sustainable usage such as rubber harvest and sustenance existence. The lust for money and comfort and power is a form of corruption. Also, people are not an endangered species but the uragutans are!
You can NOT justify the
You can NOT justify the Inhumane killing of these beautiful primates! In 20 years it is predicted that the orangutan will be extinct. What does this mean that palm oil is so important that we must kill our closest relative, the people of the world really must act now and get our priorites right! I know there is nothing I want more and thats for the children of the future to be able to enjoy orangutan's in the wild not just displayed in zoo's around the world! MAKE YOUR VOICE HEARD TODAY!!!!
Choose one of these: 1.
Choose one of these:
1. Attack Iraq: kill human for oil to donate the monkeys; look yourself!
2. Protocol Kyoto or Detroit; look yourself!
3. Soybean oil need 5 times acreage area than palm oil; calculate!
Let's look to ourselves.
Boy Howdy,
You should look at yourself. Take a long, hard one.
That is horrible orangutans
That is horrible orangutans are already endangerd speices. And really aren't they already killing them by taking away there trees so why do they have to kill them like that? I mean I am totally against them taking there habitat but that is just to torture them I would say! why would you inhumainly kill any animal? I am discusted!!!
I agree! If you want to help
I agree! If you want to help orangutans, do the following
1. Dont buy palm oil
2. Look in your pantry and see if any palm oil products, if there is dont buy
Ex. GIRL SCOUT COOKIES! Dont contribute to the killings of these poor animals.
DONT BUY PALM OIL SAVE THE ORANGUTANS!
orangutans dying
Ifor one live in the west I consume palm oil in almost every product I use. I am baffled why you people worry so much about apes when the k funny bone we all have.people are living in poverty. Will you bring a family from there home to share your food,paycheque, allowance etc. These workers are paid crap by the company they don't have the luxury of unions strikes etc. So what is an answer? How about the govt. take out the corruption, stop clearing land for profot to companies only. I do not have a lot of sympathy for the apes, they were (in my humble opinion) doing fine staying away from man, until birute galdakis and her ilk came and destroyed the fine balance of nature, by acclimatizing the apes to human contact. That is the origin of the problem, these dogooders barging in and disrupting the lives of apes with study and contact. And some of the apekilla responses I have read are hilarious read them yourself, they will hit that dark funny bone.
Dreamer
I really hope, that you know how much money a worker get for his work. Do you really think that the poor people are the sunny side since there are big companies selling the tropical wood for making paper and makes afterward big money with the palmoil? Rainforest protection = protection of the amimals and the humans. It is important, that the forest will be used, not destroid. It is possible to plant for oil, there are very good pojects on the way. There is a link (in german)
http://www.euroid.com/Die-EURO-I-D-unterstuetzt-ein-Projekt-zur-Rettung-von-Orang-Utans-in-Borneo-News-Fachartikel-101.html