Source: UN News Centre

6 Feb 2007 - The orangutan, one of the world’s few great apes, is making its laststand in the jungles of Indonesia as illegal logging accelerates at afar faster rate than previously thought, and emergency action is needed now to ensure their survival, including international initiatives tocurb demand for the lumber, a new United Nations report warned today.

Without direct intervention in the parks, orangutans and other forest-dependent wildlife will become progressively scarcer, until theirpopulations are no longer viable in the long-term,” according to the Rapid Response report from the UN Environment Programme (UNEP).

The study – Last stand of the orangutan: State of emergency – saysnatural rainforests of Sumatra and Borneo are being cleared so rapidly that up to 98 per cent may be destroyed by 2022 without urgent action,outstripping projections of an earlier UNEP report by 10 years due to anacceleration in the past five years of illegal logging, estimated to account for more than 73 per cent of all logging in Indonesia.

As demand grows, the industry and international market are running outof cheap illegal timber and are now entering the national parks, the orangutan’s last refuge, where the only remaining timber available incommercial amounts is found. “At current rates of intrusions, it islikely that some parks may become severely degraded in as little as three to five years, that is by 2012,” the new study warns.

Overall loss of orangutan habitat is happening at a rate up to 30 percent higher than previously thought. The report notes that Indonesia is active in fighting illegal logging and has worked with a series ofinternational programmes and initiatives to reduce the logging.

But most long-term initiatives, like reducing corruption and certification of timber, require the substantial support of theinternational community including recipients of illegally logged timber,as well as “massive changes” in management regimes and long-term institutional change.“

Some or all of these responses may potentially have paramount effects in the long-term, but they will generally take too much time to developto an effective level and will fall short of the immediate crisis insecuring the future survival of the orangutan and the protection of national parks,” the report warns.

“Immediate on-the-ground action isrequired to back up the global-scale efforts towards sustainable woodproduction.” It calls for substantially strengthening Indonesia’s own efforts withthe rapid deployment of reconnaissance units, removal of illegalplantations, mining and agricultural development inside the parks and

enhanced international law enforcement programmes against illegal logging.

UNEP Executive Director Achim Steiner noted that the logging is not done“by individual impoverished people, but by well-organized elusivecommercial networks,” and he called on the international community to

aid the Indonesian authorities with equipment, training and funding to patrol their national parks from illegal loggers.

National Parks form a cornerstone in the 2010 target to reduce the rateof biodiversity loss and are also so valuable for eco-tourism and in generating new livelihoods. Their protection is vital to theseinternational goals and to the entire concept of protected areas,” hesaid.



The scale of illegal logging, including in national parks, is likely to increase not only in Indonesia, but also in other parts of Asia, Africaand Latin America, the leader of the Response team, Christian Nellemann,noted. “The situation is now acute,” he said.



The report was prepared by GRASP, the Great Ape Survival Partnershiplead by UNEP and the UN Educational, Scientific and CulturalOrganization (UNESCO) in collaboration with a wide range ofnon-governmental organizations (NGOs).



Bornean and Sumatran orangutans are classed as Endangered and Critically

Endangered. Recent estimates suggest there are between 45,000 and 69,000 Bornean andno more than 7,300 Sumatran orangutans left in the wild.