CASE NUMBER:419
CASE MNEMONIC:ORANG
CASE NAME: INDONESIAN ORANGUTAN EXTINCTION
I. Identification1. The Issue
Indonesia is facing a threat to its tropical rainforests and its orangutan population. MNC logging operations, swidden agriculture, and the voluntary migration of indigenous Indonesians, are policies the Indonesian Government has recently adopted, posing a threat to the biodiversity of the Islands of Borneo and Sumatra. Most of the policies have been adopted to help Indonesia service its debt to the developed world, and if the Indonesian Government continues with its current agricultural policies, the East Asian tropical rainforest could become extinct in the not so distant future, taking with it many endangered species. One species of animal that is endangered is the orangutan, which can only be found on the Indonesian islands of Borneo and Sumatra. Many scientists have theories of how the Orangutan can be saved, but all agree that Indonesian deforestation should be slowed, and the developed world must provide some assistance to Indonesia so it can pay its debts without having to compromise its environmental biodiversity.2. Description
Indonesia is facing a problem of deforestation in its tropical rainforests. The deforestation has been a result of developed countries� multinational corporations� need for wood, pulp and plywood products, along with the Indonesian government�s lack of vigilance in an attempt to maintain some protection for its own rainforest. As a result, 40% of the Indonesian rainforest has been deforested, and a current estimate of fifty acres per minute continues to be logged at the present time. As the logging continues, a great area of biodiversity is lost, as 60% of the world�s animal and plant species, and 90% of the world�s primate species are found within the rich habitat of the Asian rainforest.(1) The one animal in the rainforest that may suffer the most from the deforestation is the orangutan. Even though the Indonesian government has set aside some national park space to preserve the orangutan's habitat, corruption within the government and illegal logging and poaching run the risk of nullifying any attempts at saving the orangutan. Therefore, in the near future we might discuss the orangutan�s existence in the past tense, rather than in the present, as it runs the risk of extinction. Indonesian DeforestationWhen analyzing the current problems that the orangutan's face, the central issue involves the deforestation within Indonesia. Indonesia's tropical rainforests remained quite lush and intact until the end of the nineteenth century, where 95% of the forest had not been harvested. With the onset of the industrialization and mechanized logging, the land areas of Borneo and Sumatra within Indonesia had undergone devastating clearcutting practices until the mid 1980's, when the Indonesian Government began to implement forestry management programs. Even with the forest management programs, a large amount of Indonesia's forest had already been damaged, and much of its biodiversity and soil quality was destroyed.
Over the past forty years, the accelerated pace of transformation of the Indonesian forest has not only been a result of logging practices, but also the conversion of the forest by the indigenous populations to grassy plains for agricultural purposes or swidden agriculture.(2) Swidden agriculture is the result of an Indonesian Government program to move approximately 6,000 families from the overcrowded urban areas, to the more remote areas of the islands, where they can raise farms to support their families. But the remote areas of the islands contain highly dense tropical forests that must be cleared for the swidden agricultural uses, involving an enormous reduction of biodiversity and the loss of endemic species to the forest such as the tiger, elephant and orangutan.
Other effects of the Indonesian Government�s forest clearance for agricultural purposes include damage to the soils of the forest and rapid erosion of the forest floor. Forests protect against erosion, and much of the research into soil and hydrology confirms that, "although it is wrong to assume that no erosion takes place under the forest, there is a jump of major order once the forest is cleared."(3) With the increased erosion of the forests of Borneo and Sumatra, the natural hydrological regimes have become disrupted in somewhat of a domino effect, where increased runoff has lead to greater stream silt yields, that have lead to increased water capacity for rivers and streams causing the possibilities of flash floods after heavy rainstorms. Thus, the various land settlement programs that the Indonesian government have devised, turned the fragile areas of the East Asian tropical forest into endangered areas by developing the forests of Borneo and Sumatra in inappropriate ways.
The land settlement programs are not the only problem facing the Indonesian rainforest, as an extremely large amount of deforestation is a result of Japanese MNC clearcutting practices. The longing for wood and wood byproducts by Japanese MNCs is fueled mainly by the large amount of construction that takes place in Japan, as Japanese MNCs must import over 70% of the wood they use.(4) Much of the wood must be relatively free of blemishes and knots, so that it can be manufactured into plywood forms for concrete that have approximately three uses until they will be thrown away, but if the wood is blemished, it will usually be utilized for pulp within the paper mills.
This type of logging and environmental degradation is not new to many of the Southeastern Asian countries, as the Japanese MNCs have moved from deforesting the Philippines, to Sabah, and now they are invading Sarawak (see table 1). In Sarawak, the MNC logging practices are extremely destructive because of the large amount of land cleared for roads and work space (e.g.; 14% of total amount of deforestation), as well as 40% of the logged area is completely denuded by the logging MNC.(5) An example of the MNC destruction was that "one selectively logged hectare in Sarawak, where 26 trees where taken out for timber, 33 more were broken or badly damaged."(6) In addition, many Japanese MNCs, Mitsubishi included, have not engaged in an organized replanting effort of what they have logged, and have simply left the developing country�s land barren and desolate.
Table 1: Japanese MNC Deforestation in East Asia* YEAR PHILIPPINES SABAH SARAWAK 1980 1,100 6,300 2,300 1981 1,400 5,500 2,900 1982 1,300 6,400 4,000 1983 600 6,200 4,100 1984 900 5,500 4,300 1985 500 5,900 5,400 1986 260 6,000 4,800 1987 27 7,000 5,500 1988 32 5,400 5,300 1989 10 4,600 5,600 *Rounded off to hundreds; the numbers represent 1,000 cubic meters Source: Borneo Log; The Struggle for Sarawak's ForestEcologists agree that the Indonesian rainforest can be saved with an interactive plan by the government for two managed cuts over 80 years, instead of the current three, four and five cuts that are occurring within that 80 year period. However, the effort of managed forestry will be difficult for the Indonesian Government to implement because the "forestry and timber manufacturing employment within Indonesia are as high as 3.7 million [directly], supporting approximately 15 million Indonesian people [indirectly]," and much of the government�s profits from the logging efforts are utilized to service Indonesia�s U.S.$2 billion per year debt to Japan.(7) If there is any hope for the future maintenance of biodiversity of Indonesia's rainforest, and the survivability of the wild orangutan, the Indonesian Government, and the developed countries of the world should devise a means to help Indonesia balance its economic problems, with its political and ecological problems. Oragutan Alert
There is an underlying disdain by Indonesia directed toward the hypocrisy of the developed countries of the world in their attempts to pressure Indonesia into the husbandry of their resources to save endangered animals such as the orangutan, because many of the developed countries of the world have already depleted their own natural resources. But the orangutan is such a unique primate, that a closer look at it, and its environment, should be taken into account. The orangutan is surprisingly similar to human beings in that 97% of their DNA matches ours, our common gestation period is 275 days, and we both have fingernails rather than claws.(8) However, one main difference between orangutans and human beings is that the orangutan is a category 5 endangered species with approximately 10,000 to 20,000 remaining on only two islands in the world, that includes Borneo and Sumatra, while human beings are no where near endangered, and are wiping out much of the orangutan�s habitat. The habitat destruction is occurring due to the legal and illegal logging operations on Borneo and Sumatra in order to clear land for agricultural purposes, and the logging is destroying much of the primate's main food sources which are fruit trees.
While the forest destruction occurs, and the orangutan population decreases, the primates have become pressured by another source, and that is poachers. The poachers engage in the capture of infant orangutans, which usually involves the killing of the mother animal, so that wealthy individuals, circuses and zoos in various countries will be able to purchase the babies on the black market. The smuggling operation is a startling fact, but even more startling is that between 1988 and 1990, as many as 3000 young orangutans may have been smuggled by boat from Indonesia, and for every baby orangutan that reaches its destination, between five and six babies have died in the process of transport.(9) Since the orangutan females only stay fertile until the age of thirty, and tend to have only three to four babies in their lifetimes, it becomes difficult for the orangutan population to keep up with the poaching efforts, especially when they are continually becoming stressed by a habitat loss. The stress that is being placed upon the neglected ape is causing the primate to be placed in a very vulnerable position, and one that it may not survive through.
The survivability of the orangutan population mainly depends upon Indonesian rainforest degradation, which is the most significant threat confronting the conservation of the status of the species. That is because "the great majority of orangutan habitat is in lowland rainforest," in which most orangutans live a majority of their lives in the tree canopy of the forest.(10) But the canopy of trees has been under attack by many Japanese logging operations, and even though much of the timber extraction by the MNCs is not focussed on the fruit trees that the orangutans feed from, such as the strangling fig, the strangling figs have been dying because of large amounts of teak removal. The teak is a wood that is highly prized by the Japanese MNCs and once it is removed, the removal will often cause the strangling fig trees to die because of the disruption to the biodiversity of the rainforest.
Other hazards from commercial logging operations that the orangutans face include the building of roads for the low-land harvesting of timber. Not only does the road construction hasten the erosion processes that will take place within the orangutan habitat, but they also effectively isolate orangutan individuals from one another, leaving the primates with no migratory corridors with which to travel in search of a mate. When the isolation occurs, scientists have noted a significant drop in genetic diversity within the orangutan population, that leads to future birth defects among the animals. Therefore, scientists have devised three recommendations to attempt a reversal of orangutan isolation, and these include; (1) restore the connection between separated populations of orangutans with the destruction and replanting of commercial logging roads; (2) do not permit as many new roads to be built within the rainforest; and (3) try to reduce future forest loss.(11) The three recommendations provide a good beginning for a plan of preservation so that the orangutan might have a chance at survival.
Other recommendations that many scientists have made may also contribute to rainforest biodiversity and orangutan survivability. One such recommendation is that more hard data must be collected on how many orangutans are left in the wild, which includes exactly how many hectares of forest are necessary to ensure the orangutans survival. The lack of quantifiable data poses great problems for scientists, who can only make broad approximations concerning the orangutan and its habitat. Also, since habitat loss is the principle threat to orangutan survival, "it follows that habitat protection should be the highest priority," and many scientists recommend a direct conservation program through the establishment and management of protected areas.(12) But, "many of the benefits of protected areas, and especially the reasons for conserving the orangutan, are more apparent in a national or global prospective, as most of the costs of refraining from exploiting the protected animals are borne locally."(13)
This asymmetry lies at the heart of many problems with conservation programs in developing countries, where attention is demanded for the problems and welfare of the indigenous populations, whose lives are affected by the creation of protected areas. Often times, when the indigenous populations' livelihoods are encroached upon, they will engage in the damaging acts of poaching endangered animals, that can fetch many thousands of dollars on the black market. Therefore, the issues and problems of orangutan conservation should be viewed within the wider context of the economic and social development of Indonesia, and there should be a review of the role of the developed countries, private sector, international aid agencies and non-governmental organizations in order for there to occur an integration of conservation and development.
Many scientists from the developed world have been contributing to the preservation and protection of the Indonesian orangutans, by developing rehabilitation centers in Indonesia for orangutans that have suffered from malnutrition, caused by being poached and sold as pets on the black market. Often times the baby primates arrive at an individual owner from the black market in a very cute and cuddly manner, but as the orangutan grows and develops around human beings, it can become roguish, bite, defecate in unwanted places, and pass on diseases to the owners. When this behavior begins, and the pet owner realizes that the primates are not a pet that can be easily taken care of, the orangutans are often abandoned and die in areas of the world that they cannot survive the climate conditions. Therefore, the rehabilitation centers within Indonesia provide a safe haven, and a means of recovery for the abandoned orangutans that may manage to survive a trip back to their homeland of Borneo or Sumatra.
Along with the rehabilitation centers for the orangutans, there have been other developments to try and ensure the survival of the orangutan. One of the developments includes a new proposal by the Indonesian Ministry of Forestry, under a new energetic administrator who is "actively seeking the ways and means to call a halt to the ongoing deforestation of the orangutan's habitat."(14) The new orangutan survival program includes an attempt to "increase law enforcement, and stop the current surge of illegal capture, killing, and trading of orangutans, by means of a reintroduction program."(15) But much of the rhetoric from the Indonesian Ministry of Forestry has already been expressed in the past, and we cannot be sure if the Ministry is truly concerned for its orangutan population. Managing Tropical Rainforests in a More Sustainable Manner
Indonesia must learn to manage its tropical rainforests in a more sustainable manner than it has in the past, even though there is the fear of the short run economic costs of environmental protection. That is because Indonesia is one of the few countries in the world with fairly large tracts of virgin rainforest that have become a priority for protection. Therefore, since the forest is so valuable in its natural state, the theoretical principle is that logging or land conversion on a specific forest should only take place if the net benefits of exploitation outweigh the net benefits of forest conservation, taking into account all of the relative costs and benefits of the various land use options. The problem with this economic calculation is that land conversion from logging and agriculture are fairly easy to calculate. Conversely, the benefits of forest conservation are diverse and it can be difficult to measure the markets for ecotourism, recreation, human habitat, and the habitat of a variety of endangered species.
Even when examining new uses for the rainforest such as ecotourism, it still cannot be forgotten that Indonesia is highly dependent upon its timber industry in order to service its debts to the developed world. This is a main reason why the logging will most likely not stop, and if it does not stop, there should be methods developed in order to streamline MNC logging operations. The first streamlining method would be to bring about a required operating efficiency level to all wood processing plants in Indonesia. It is estimated that approximately US$182 million is lost annually due to inefficient wood processing and waste. A second recommendation would be to immediately stop the Indonesian resettlement program that is overcrowding its outer islands and leading to vast tracts of deforestation for agricultural purposes.
A third and final recommendation is for improved management of the Indonesian conservation areas. Indonesia has set aside 10% of its land area for conservation, which is "a much larger area than so designated in most developed and developing countries."(16) In total, nearly 20 million ha are set aside as reserves and another 30 million ha as permanent protection forest.(17) With this large amount of protected area, the Indonesian Government should maintain increased vigilance against any type of encroachment upon the land for either agricultural purposes, or for the purposes of poaching endangered species. That becomes increasingly difficult when the management efforts suffer from a severe shortage of funds and staff to aid in the management of the reserves. Without the staff or funds to protect the forests, poaching, and legal as well as illegal logging will be able to continue its rampant run.
There are also other political variables that must be taken into account for why Indonesia's deforestation is continuing. The first variable comes from the attitudes of Indonesian decision makers toward development, because most of the attitudes have been "rooted in colonial experience and based upon a western understanding of development."(18) Most of the colonial powers have been replaced by a new land-owning elite, nearly all of whom were educated in western-oriented schools and many were taught the principles of economic liberalism and development through industrialization. Some of the western concepts of development are based on a set of "attitudes and values that is chiefly concerned with shaping the world of nature through science and technology to make the world more prosperous, and with these beliefs, it is easy to see why Indonesia's political leaders are allowing its current deforestation to continue."(19)
These powerful political leaders have promoted destructive logging practices over many years, in large part because of corrupt deals, and back room meetings, resulting in concessions to logging MNCs in exchange for political, military or monetary favors. The illegal concessions, based upon political and economic interests, often overshadow the "concerns of Indonesia's Department of Environment," but even Indonesia�s Department of the Environment is not immune to the corruption that occurs within the government.(20)
One would think that with the extensive political, economic and environmental implications of Indonesian deforestation, international organizations such as the IMF and the World Bank, along with the aid of the developed world would provide policy advice and set conditions to discourage deforestation in the country. In reality, it is quite the contrary, as "IMF policies have encouraged import of manufactured goods and northern technology in exchange for natural resources including timber," while the "World Bank and Asian Development Bank have helped finance development projects in Indonesia such as hydroelectric dams, roads and transmigration, all of which contribute to deforestation."(21) In addition to the international organizations, developed countries such as Japan have played an important role in Indonesian deforestation, due to Indonesia's need to obtain foreign exchange to service its increasing economic debt to Japan.
II. Legal Clusters III. Geographic Clustersa. Geographic Domain: ASIA
b. Geographic Site: EAST ASIA
c. Geographic Impact: INDONESIA
IV. Trade Clustersa. Directly Related to Product:YES ORANGUTAN
b. Indirectly Related to Product:YES WOOD
c. Not Related to Product:YES PLYWOOD
d. Related to Process:YES SPECIES LOSS LAND
V. Environment ClustersName:ORANGUTAN
Type:MAMMAL
Diversity:There are between 10,000 and 20,000 that exist in the wild of Borneo and Sumatra
VI. Other Factors
