U.S. supports “Heart of Borneo” conservation initiative
U.S. supports “Heart of Borneo” conservation initiative
mongabay.com
August 2, 2006
Tuesday, the U.S. State Department issued a statement supporting the “Heart of Borneo” conservation initiative that will protect 220,000 square kilometers of tropical rainforest across Malaysia, Indonesia and Brunei.
“The United States applauds the vision of the Governments of Malaysia, Indonesia and Brunei to establish a “Heart of Borneo” conservation plan that will help conserve 220,000 square kilometers of biodiversity-rich equatorial rainforest that straddles their shared borders and which constitutes a significant portion of the island of Borneo,” read the statement.
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice also announced a pledge of $100,000 to “help advance this regional project focused on combating illegal logging and wildlife trafficking.” during her press conference with Malaysian Foreign Minister Syed Hamid in Kuala Lumpur on July 28, 2006. The funds will be disbursed through the World Wildlife Fund and the International Tropical Timber Organization.
Orangutan in Kalimantan, photo by Rhett A. Butler. More pictures from Borneo |
According to the statement: “This conservation project serves to significantly enhance U.S. international conservation objectives under the President’s Initiative Against Illegal Logging (PIAIL) and the Coalition Against Wildlife Trafficking (CAWT). The PIAIL, launched in 2003, consolidates U.S. Government efforts, in alliance with industry and NGOs, to help developing countries improve forest governance and sustainable forest management. CAWT is a new international public-private partnership aimed at stopping the illegal trade in wildlife and wildlife products.”
Borneo, the third largest island in the world, was once covered with dense rainforests. With swampy coastal areas fringed with mangrove forests and a mountainous interior, much of the terrain was virtually impassable and unexplored. Headhunters ruled the remote parts of the island until a century ago.
In the 1980s and 1990s Borneo underwent a remarkable transition. Its forests were leveled at a rate unparalleled in human history—perhaps 80 percent of the island’s primary forest was lost since 1980. Borneo’s rainforests went to industrialized countries like Japan and the United States in the form of garden furniture, paper pulp and chopsticks. Initially most of the timber was taken from the Malaysian part of the island in the northern states of Sabah and Sarawak. Later forests in the southern part of Borneo, an area belonging to Indonesia and known as Kalimantan, became the primary source for tropical timber. Today the forests of Borneo are but a shadow of those of legend.
In recent years Borneo’s remaining forests had been cleared for oil palm plantations. Indonesia’s oil palm plantations grew from 600,000 hectares in 1985 to more than 4 million hectares by early 2006 when the government announced a plan to develop 3 million additional hectares of oil palm plantations by 2011. Oil palm (Elaeis guineensis) is an attractive plantation crop because it is the cheapest vegetable oil and produces more oil per hectare than any other oilseed. In the current environment of high energy prices, palm oil is seen as a good way to meet increasing demand for biofuel as an alternative energy source.
When the Indonesian government announced plans to significantly expand oil palm acreage in Borneo it met strong condemnation by environmental groups, especially WWF, which produced a number of reports that revealed the island’s striking biodiversity. WWF’s findings also likely played a part in Malaysia’s recent decision to phase out logging in more than 200,000 hectares of key forest habitat in the Bornean state of Sabah.
WWF says that this new initiative is an important step to safeguarding the biological diversity of Borneo while providing opportunities for economic activities that provde for local people without diminishing the forest resource base.
“WWF considers the Heart of Borneo to be one of its top global priorities,” added Leape. “It is hugely important to maintain a large enough area of Borneo’s forests for the survival of the natural ecosystems. This is critical for sustainable development, and WWF stands ready to assist Borneo’s three governments with technical and financial support, so that we can make the conservation vision a reality.”
RELATED ARTICLES
Saving Orangutans in Borneo May 24, 2006
The air is warm and heavy with the morning humidity typical of the Borneo rain forest as our kelotok, a traditional boat, motors up a river so black in color it could be mistaken for ink. The raucous calls of a pair of hornbills can be heard over the rumble of the engine as they fly overhead with their gaudy and over-sized beak adornments.
Pictures of the Borneo rainforest March 28, 2006
Mongabay.com, a leading rainforest information web site, has launched a new section featuring photographs from the island of Borneo. More than 500 photos from Kalimantan—the Indonesian part of the island—have been added to the site.
This article contains quotes from a State Department press release and previous mongabay.com articles.
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