Threats!
The Palm Oil Industry is Ruthless and Rich
Since the 1990s, the industry has expanded exponentially, and will likely be worth a whopping $90 billion by 2022 (Palm, 2017). In fact, currently, nearly 50% of all consumer goods contain palm oil or its derivatives (Good, 2014). Industries of this size are difficult to fight against, a prime example being the Indonesian government’s lack of regulation when it comes to palm oil. As forests are ruthlessly cleared, Orangutan habitat grows ever smaller; these plantations stretch sometimes hundreds of square kilometers (Palm, 2017). Not only is habitat being lost, but plantation workers are taught to kill orangutans if they are found on the plantation. In the past decade alone, 20,000 orangutans have been clubbed to death by the palm oil industry (Good, 2014).
The Battle for Survival
The Palm Oil Epidemic - Orangutans are Dying For your Chips
Throughout the tropics, palm oil plantations are ruthlessly expanding, obliterating everything in their path by clear-cutting the rainforest and burning the Orangutans alive while they hold their babies in their arms. Critical habitats and beautiful forests are constantly being replaced by symmetric rows of palm trees. These helpful, hardworking animals’ habitat is being destroyed at an alarming rate because of humans.
Currently, palm oil plantations cover over 27 million hectares of the earth's surface, and these destructive plantations just keep expanding (Palm Oil – Deforestation, 2017). Just in the last 10 years, orangutan populations have decreased by nearly 50%, mostly due to palm oil plantations. These plantations are barren wastelands where wildlife cannot survive. Most of the exotic wildlife which used to live in these forests is starved to death when their homes are cleared out in order to make room for plantations (The Crisis, 2017).
Oh Government!
One of the biggest issues we face in the brutal fight to protect these critically endangered creatures is the disregard of the national law by the Sumatran government. They are currently ruling in favor of letting exploitative companies use the forest for their own personal gain, even forest which is protected under national law (Orangutan, 2015). The Aceh government of Sumatra has political jurisdiction over the vibrant Leuser Ecosystem Conservation Area, one of the last areas where Sumatran Orangutans dwell. This corrupt government stands in the way of Sumatran Orangutan preservation by endorsing the creation of massive palm oil plantations and road building rather than conservation efforts of this critical habitat (Singleton, 2016 ). Both of these lead to deforestation, and the terrible truth is that this is the leading cause behind the orangutan’s extreme decline in recent years (Singleton, 2016).
Exploitation, Fragmentation, What’s Next?
Not only do these practices reduce the amount of habitat for these wildly playful animals, but it also fragments it. Habitat fragmentation happens when structures like roads break apart critical habitat, reducing the size and making the once remote region of forest suddenly accessible to humans. But the Aceh government problem is far more broad, as the Indonesian government as a whole tends to stress the need to extract revenue from their natural resources rather than protect them. Often, they fail to enforce the few environmental laws which they do have in place (Palm, 2017). In order to ensure orangutan survival, we must make governments have conservation be a priority rather than exploitation.
Loving Mothers - A Reproductive Crisis
Orangutans, much like us, spend so much time caring for and nurturing their young, that they are unable to recover from endangerment. Females usually begin creating their families when they are between 6 and 11 years old, and are they are pregnant for around 9 months just like humans. Typically orangutans only have one child per birth, although occasionally they may have two or three (Knott, Thomas, et al, 2010). Female orangutans rarely have more than two to three babies during their lives (Knott, Thomas, et al, 2010). All of these factors combined give Sumatran Orangutans an incredibly low biotic potential, and makes it difficult for their population to rebound from these horrible crimes against them. This is one of the many factors that give these animals low resilience. They have not been able to combat the many threats to their survival, which is why we must speak for them.
Their Babies Are Being Kidnapped
In addition to the other perils they face, baby orangutans are regularly ripped from their shot mothers arms in order to be shipped around the world in small metal crates as part of the illegal pet trade. Sumatran Orangutans are incredibly gentle and sweet, which is part of the reason why they are so popular as pets. Because people and zoos will pay a lot of money for little orangutans, poachers go into Sumatran Orangutan habitat, killing the mother and taking the baby (Sumatran Orangutan (Pongo abelii), 2017). These mothers and babies are critical to the survival of the Sumatran Orangutans population, especially because of how rarely orangutans give birth (Knott, Thomas, et al, 2010).
A rainforest cleared for palm oil (Cabrill's Problems with Palm Oil, 2008)
Two young orangutans in a sanctuary (Jungle Man, 2006).
A desolate, destroyed forest (Landscape, 2017).
A mother and her daughter (Smooch, 2006).