22/11/2011 (Bernama) -- The Lower Kinabatangan located on the east coast of Sabah has lost about 300 orang utan in seven years due to forest isolation and loss of corridors, according to Dr Marc Ancrenaz, the scientific director of HUTAN - Kinabatangan Orang Utan Conservation Programme (KOCP).

"What we are seeing from our latest surveys within the Lower Kinabatangan is a clear population decline of orang utan in this area," said Ancrenaz who hoped such issues would add to the urgency of discussions at events such as the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) meeting being held in Kota Kinabalu for the first time this week.

He said the biggest threat to orang utan and other wildlife populations in Sabah today was fragmentation, adding that agriculture development, primarily for oil palm, had created small islands of forest surrounded by human-made landscapes.

"As it is difficult for wildlife to move from one forest patch to the next, this situation leads to inbreeding and eventual population decline, which is what we are witnessing today in the Lower Kinabatangan," he said in a statement, here, today.

He said the issue was inherently related to the oil palm sector, which could with its resources, take real action and rectify the situation, such as through replanting of trees and planning for wildlife corridors that support movement of wildlife between protected or forested areas.

This, according to Ancrenaz, had been paid much lip service by big organisations but in reality, only the local communities had successfully carried out such work.

"Except for Wilmar/PBB Oil which is replanting 382 hectares, 50 metres from the banks of the river, we mostly see signboards and newspaper articles but when you go to the ground you find that in reality there is more talk than actual viable replanting taking place," he said.

Perhaps, the money the Malaysian government is spending for oil palm promotion such as the recent allocation of RM24 million for the Malaysian Oil Palm Council could instead be used for establishing real corridors and patches of forest in the Lower Kinabatangan, Ancrenaz suggested.

"While there are many reforestation programmes taking place within the Lower Kinabatangan, the best known being the work by the community of Batu Putih, we need oil palm companies to start planting back corridors along the riverbanks, in particular.

"This will not only help wildlife but also improve the water quality for local communities living along the river," said Ancrenaz.

As the situation is getting even more grim in the Lower Kinabatangan, he urged oil palm companies that own forest patches to reconsider converting these, as even small pockets such as 10 hectares have a negative effect on the long-term survival of the orang utan population.

"If oil palm companies want to contribute to orang utan conservation today, they have the opportunity to do so in the Lower Kinabatangan by stopping what little land conversion they are still planning to carry out," he said, adding that the largest number of RSPO-certified companies were operating in Sabah and could step up the challenge of replanting riverbanks with natural forests.

He said orang utan populations in other parts of Sabah with large contiguous forests such as Malua, Deramakot and Tabin had remained stable in the same period of time.

"The difference between those areas and the Lower Kinabatangan is that they have a large area that is not broken up. This highlights the urgency of the situation and the need for more oil palm plantations to replant corridors and leave patches of forest," urged Ancrenaz.