2/1/06 (Rednova)  -  Endangered orang-utans in Indonesian Borneo are suffering routine physical abuse when they stray into palm oil plantations, say wildlife groups and campaigners in the region. Poor migrant workers, often encouraged by the offer of extra pay from rainforest loggers, trap the animals and beat them to death.

Wildlife rescue centres in Indonesia are overflowing with displaced and injured orang-utans, many of which have suffered horrific injuries at the hands of their captors, says the Borneo Orangutan Survival Foundation (BOS). In a particularly cruel killing, a male was buried alive, and in another an orang-utan was doused in petrol by rainforest loggers and set alight.

'Orang-utans are particularly resilient animals and hard to kill,' said Michelle Desilets, director of BOS UK. 'Sometimes they are shot but more often than not they are killed with machetes or beaten to death.'

Iolo Williams, a wildlife expert who recently returned from the region, said he went to a rescue centre near the Kalimantan Rainforest in Indonesian Borneo where he saw baby orang-utans who had had their hands cut off as they clung to their mothers. 'What I saw was horrendous. Coming back from Borneo made me doubt if there was any hope for mankind'.

Loggers in Indonesian and Malaysian Borneo are notorious for killing large numbers of orang-utans every year, but new claims of abuse on the Indonesian side suggest a level of vindictiveness not seen before.

Sue Sheward, founder of the Sepilok Orangutan Appeal which works with the Malaysian government, said the brutal manner in which loggers and locals treated orang-utans in Borneo was unparalleled. 'Things in Indonesia are just awful. I'm not at all surprised they are being abused.'

The global demand for palm oil, one of the world's most popular vegetable oils and used in products such as soap, chocolate and lipstick, is encouraging the destruction of the orang-utan. Ninety per cent of the world's palm oil comes from Malaysia and Indonesia, and most of the plantations are on the islands of Borneo and Sumatra. As rainforests are cleared to make way for plantations, the orang-utans are forced out, and are either killed or captured to be sold as pets.

Campaigners say that Britain, the second biggest importer of palm oil in Europe after the Netherlands, and consumers should take a leading role in ensuring the product does not come from destructive sources.

Orang-utans, which share 96.7 per cent of human genetic make-up, are a critically endangered species, and of the 50,000 left in Borneo an estimated 5,000 will be lost each year.



Source: Independent, The; London (UK)