10 minutes with Mel Gibson: When going green comes naturally

NISHA SABANAGAM and FARIDUL ANWAR FARINORDIN

NISHA SABANAGAM and FARIDUL ANWAR FARINORDIN had lunch with Mel Gibson recently during his recent surprise visit to Malaysia. They managed to get the acclaimed Hollywood director to talk about his love for the environment and the rainforest.

Q: How did you become so environmentally conscious?
A: I grew up in a family that was environmentally conscious. My dad had an organic garden. He even had beehives. I have a cattle range, and I make sure we use no pesticides or unnatural products.

Q: Why the focus on the rainforest?
A: I was in awe. Just a few weeks ago I was in the Guatemalan rainforest looking at bugs, thinking ‘What on earth is that?’
I saw some critters I have never seen before. The entomologist I was with said, ‘I don’t know, why don’t we take a picture of it and give it a name?’There are 1.4 million species of insects in the rainforest that they have identified. There are eight-and-a-half million more that they don’t know what to call or what they are good for.It’s not out of the ordinary to have some guy with a machete and a sombrero come out and say ‘Here, eat some of this stuff, it’s really good for diabetes.’ It just goes to show there is amazing untapped potential in the rainforest.

Q: What about your family? Does your family try to live a green lifestyle?
A: I think they’re pretty cool about the stuff, having grown up with that kind of influence. I don’t preach about it. My father never preached to me about being organic. I just really liked what he practised. I thought he was cool. My kids are also pretty cool about it. Had an electric car for a while. Bicycles, walking, all these things are energy savers.Q: What do you think about Malaysia’s rainforest?A: Well, I haven’t really had a chance to see it properly. But I may be going to Danum Valley in Sabah soon. This is only my second visit to Malaysia. The last time I was here was 10 years ago to promote a movie.

Q: Do you have any movies in the pipeline at the moment?
A: There are a lot of different productions in the works, maybe three or four. It takes a long time to get scripts that are really worthwhile. I think, nowadays, a lot of people have forgotten how important it is to have a good story. Computer-generated images and technology seem to be getting bigger. We really need to get back to basics.

Q:Will your stories have environmental messages like Apocalypto which is set during the decline of the Mayan civilisation?
A:I found out that it doesn’t really pay to tell people what you are doing because every time I’ve done that, someone else always tries to do it first. I don’t know why they think I have such great ideas.

Q: It was rumoured that your recent visit to Costa Rica was to scout for locations for your upcoming epic about the 16th Century Spanish explorer Vasco Nunez De Balboa. Is this true?
A: Don’t believe everything you read.

Rainforest art expo

Rainforest art expo
KUCHING: Over 120 paintings submitted for the Sarawak Rainforest Painting Competition 2007 are on display and for auction at a two-week exhibition which started yesterday.
Organised by Sarawak Tourism Board (STB) and Galleria, a local art gallery, the competition was open to students in two age groups, 12-15 and 16-18, between March and September this year.
The top three paintings in each category will have a starting price of RM50 and the rest RM30 in the auction, with subsequent bids priced at a minimum raise of RM10.
STB chief executive Gracie Geikie called on corporate bodies and organisations to support the event by bidding for the paintings. The proceeds will go to charity.

Idyllic: One of the winning entries on display at the exhibition in Kuching.From a similar exhibition and auction held last year, STB raised over RM2,000 for Salvation Army’s Children Homes, Cheshire Home and Sarawak Association for the Welfare of Orphans.
“We hope to raise more funds this year so that more charitable organisations can benefit,” Geikie said in a statement.
Besides holding the exhibition, STB will reproduce the top three entries in both categories as postcards for use to promote Sarawak overseas.
Some of the paintings will be used as official t-shirt designs for next year’s Rainforest World Music Festival.
The exhibition and auction will be held at Sarawak Tourism Complex from 10am to 5pm daily until Nov 24.

When forests and inhabitants benefit

When forests and inhabitants benefit

From The Jakarta Post

JAKARTA: When people talk about forest conservation in Indonesia, their discussion is based on a simple equation: forests plus logging equals devastation and the loss of biodiversity. The timber companies have long been considered the number one enemy of the conservation movement, and for good reason. But is it in our best interests for that to continue?

Granted, no one can deny that the timber industry's activities have led to massive forest degradation and loss, and in many places this continues.

Biodiversity suffers whenever forests are cleared. The species found in grasslands and plantations are in no way comparable to those found in primary or lightly disturbed rain forest.

In general, timber concessions rarely follow the plethora of forest management guidelines prescribed in government laws and regulations.

Logging opens up forests, attracting other operators that illegally harvest even more timber, in turn leaving forests vulnerable to fire.

The legacy of decades of “bad” logging in Kalimantan and Sumatra has left, in many places, a degraded landscape. But not all areas were logged heavily, and “good” forest still remains in timber concessions to this day.

The most relevant way to judge logging is to ask firstly, how drastically logging changes forests; and secondly, how it affects wildlife.

Recent work shows that well-managed forestry concessions can actually benefit wildlife conservation tremendously.

Sustainably managed production forests, for example, can provide and maintain valuable habitat for many species that would otherwise disappear if the forest was lost altogether. The key issue is effective management.

The truth is that without some form of recognised management, whether it be by local communities or large enterprises, most of the accessible forests in Kalimantan and Sumatra will be claimed by someone.

The timber will be removed illegally and the forest slowly converted to either agriculture or plantations or, worse, burned and then left as barren grassland.

And it appears that it makes little difference whether these forests have protected status or not. In fact, in some parts of Kalimantan, forests disappear more rapidly from within the protected areas than outside of them.


But how do you ensure that forestry concessions are well managed?

One mechanism is to encourage independent forest certification. Four natural forest concessions in Indonesia have obtained forest management certificates from the internationally recognised Forest Stew-ardship Council (FSC) - three of them within the last year: PT Diamond Raya Timber, PT Erna Djuliawati, PT Sumalindo Lestari Jaya Unit II and PT Intracawood Manufacturing.

But getting certified is a multi-year process that requires significant management improvements. Con-cessionaires must improve management systems, adopt low-impact logging techniques, prove that their timber is both legally harvested and that it can be traced back to its source. They also must have credible environmental management systems in place, including setting aside or specifically managing forests that have high conservation values.

The question, for anyone who knows the industry, is why concessions would voluntarily invest significant sums of money in trying to achieve certification when there is little incentive for them to do so.

But keep in mind that under current business conditions, concessionaires deal with social conflict, security problems, power struggles between different levels of government, conflicting laws and regulations, illegal logging and other forms of encroachment, overlapping land use issues, weak law enforcement, extortion, and, of course, the ever-present KKN (corruption, collusion and nepotism) on the side.

As a result, the cost of doing business is now higher than ever before. And it is not just the big players that are being squeezed; local communities are also feeling the pinch.

Still, one thing is clear. Those companies that have gone down the certification path have done their math. They know how much they invested, but they also know that once they have cleared the certification hurdle, an entirely new market awaits them.

Companies on the front end of the certification wave can expect to receive a significant premium price on their certified timber.

Additional tangible financial benefits also exist such as increases in share price.

The time has never been better to work with the government to drive change, but it must happen now. Recent certification successes in Kalimantan posted by PT Sumalindo Lestari Jaya, PT Erna Djuliawati and PT Intracawood Manufacturing and collaborative management between PT Sumalindo Lestari Jaya Unit IV together with local communities and local government show that these approaches can provide an answer to the problem of Indonesia's disappearing forests and wildlife.


For Another perspective from the Jakarta Post, a partner of Asia News Network, click here

First-ever cataract surgery on orang utan

First-ever cataract surgery on orang utan
By : Annie Freeda Cruez

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KUALA LUMPUR: The world’s first cataract surgery on an orang utan will be performed at the Matang Wildlife Centre in Sarawak today.

The orang utan, known as Aman, aged 19, has cataract on both eyes and the operation will be performed on both.

The male orang utan has two female offspring, Mamu, 3, and an unnamed one-month-old baby, living in the centre.

Aman has been suffering from decreasing vision since 2000. In March, animal ophthalmologist Dr Izak Venter was flown in from South Africa to examine it.

Dr S. Sivagurunathan of the Malaysian National Animal Welfare Foundation said the animal was found to have normal retinal function with mature cataract and a decision was made to perform the surgery.
Dr Venter and anaesthetist Dr Frik Stegman, also from South Africa, will perform the two-hour surgery assisted by Dr S. Amilan, a local veterinarian.

Dr Venter, in a report he submitted to the Matang Wildlife Centre, said surgical techniques for animals had progressed and the method to be used is called phacoemulsification.

"This is not laser treatment. During the procedure, a small incision is made in the eye, then the lens is opened and the cloudy contents are removed by a probe."

He said there were situations when a lens could be replaced and in such cases, the eye would remain longsighted and thus Aman might need more time to adapt before it could see better.

The animal’s vision would not be crystal clear, but it would be able to move about and identify objects in front of it.

"Some animals show improved sight within hours whilst others may take several days," said Dr Venter.

Dr Amilan said the surgical team was excited about the operation.

"It will be the world’s first cataract surgery on an orang utan and it is going to be performed on home territory. It will be a big achievement."

All costs for the surgery is covered by donations.

Dr Sivagurunathan said Aman was a charismatic animal and with its sight restored, it would be able to enjoy a normal life.

"His offspring have a real chance to be released back into the wild in his lifetime.

"Aman was rescued from a market in Sarawak in 1989 and kept as a pet for three months before being surrendered in April 1989 and placed at the Semenggoh Wildlife Rehabilitation Centre," he added.

Aman had two serious accidents at the centre. He bit an electric cable and had to have his tongue removed and its left index finger was bitten off by another orang utan in 2000.

Aman has lived at the Matang Wildlife Centre since December 2000.

This centre was opened on July 26, 1998 and has 179ha of land dedicated to the housing and possible release of animals rescued from the area.

MNS: Release of captive-bred Milky Storks should be carefully planned

MNS: Release of captive-bred Milky Storks should be carefully planned
12 Mar 2007
Mazlinda Mahmood


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KUALA LUMPUR: The Malaysian Nature Society (MNS) is concerned with the manner in which captive-bred Milky Storks, locally known as burung upeh, were released recently in Kuala Gula, Perak.

MNS president Anthony Sebastian said introducing captive-bred storks into the wild required careful consideration and planning.

"They need a period of acclimatisation to minimise stress and ensure they can fend for themselves. If the release does not follow proper procedure, they most probably won’t survive," he said.

He was commenting on the way Natural Resources and Environment parliamentary secretary Datuk Sazmi Miah released eight captive-bred Milky Storks (Mycteria cinerea) from Zoo Negara at the Kuala Gula Bird Sanctuary to mark the World Wetlands Day recently.



The storks are on the verge of extinction and are listed as the most endangered bird species in the country.

He said the World Conservation Union has released a set of guidelines in 1995 to counter the risk of releasing captive-bred birds into the wild, which has been adhered to by MNS in the case of the existing captive-breeding programme at the Kuala Selangor Nature Park.

The programme was jointly set up by MNS, Zoo Negara and Wildlife and Natural Parks Department (Perhilitan) in the 1990s where eight birds were reintroduced and are still surviving today.

"We have eight birds living in the wild here and eventually we hope they will breed, and that is a great success for our park," he added.

The global population of Milky Storks is currently estimated to be fewer than 5,000. They can only be found in three countries — Malaysia, Indonesia and Cambodia.

Since the 1980s, the Milky Stork population in Malaysia has dwindled from around 200 to fewer than 10 in the wild today.

Telling the hunter’s tale

Telling the hunter’s tale

The indigenous way of honey-gathering is immortalised in a beautiful children’s book.

They are the honey hunters, rural folk who climb the tall trees on which the bees nest, to harvest the sweet honey and beeswax.

They brave vertigo-inducing heights of up to 70m and colonies of 40,000 to 80,000 bees with deadly stings. But they are armed with precious knowledge, techniques and rituals, which have been passed down for generations.


»I fell under the spell of the rainforests, the bees and especially Pak Teh« - DR STEPHEN BUCHMANN
These fascinating hunters are the basis for a beautiful new children’s book published in the US called The Bee Tree.

The book is about the passing down of the honey-hunting tradition to the younger generation, which, among other things, involves climbing a giant Tualang tree (Koompasia excelsa) – the bee tree.

Taking almost a decade to be actualised, the book is the result of a coming together of extraordinary people from different backgrounds.

Authored by Americans Dr Stephen Buchmann, 54, entomologist and environmental consultant, and Diana Cohn, 48, an award-winning children’s book writer and hobbyist beekeeper, it features wonderful artwork by scientific illustrator Paul Mirocha, 52.

A key collaborator in this venture is Datuk Dr Makhdzir Mardan, professor of apiculture and pollination biology at Universiti Putra Malaysia.

It was at an international bee conference at Tasik Pedu organised in 1994 by Prof Makhdzir that Dr Buchmann was introduced to Salleh Mohammed Noor (Pak Teh).

The octogenarian head of a honey hunting clan, Pak Teh has been honey hunting since 1964. One of his credos is that “as long as there is the rainforest, there will be bees, and as long as there are bees, there will be honey, and as long as there is honey, there will be honey hunters.”

Realising this relationship of honey hunting to rainforest conservation, the two scientists therefore decided to write a scientific book on Pak Teh's clan. This evolved into a children’s fiction book because “we need the people in the Pedu Lake area to protect the forest, and children are the best people to whom to get the message across,” said Prof Makhdzir.

Children must recognise these honey-hunters as local heroes and emulate the respect the men have for the rainforest.

This is especially important in light of the impending threats to both the rainforest and traditional honey hunting. “They (children) are the future custodians of the rainforest and the honey gathering culture.”

Dr Buchmann added that The Bee Tree was his way (with Cohn and Mirocha) of “immortalising” the honey hunting experiences, which affected him deeply. “I fell under the spell of the rainforests, the bees and especially Pak Teh, who was the first traditional Apis dorsata honey hunter I had ever met.”

Like Prof Makhzdir, he believed conserving the honey bees involved keeping large tracts of forest and their food plants intact as well as by spreading knowledge of this through education and eco-tourism. Dr Buchmann has authored or co-authored 150 scientific papers and eight books and is active in international pollination research, conservation and policies to protect the world’s pollinators and the plants they pollinate.


- Photo courtesy of Paul Mirocha.
To illustrate the book, Dr. Buchmann roped in Mirocha, who enthusiastically bought into the project after experiencing a honey hunt. After producing the first few drafts of The Bee Tree, Dr Buchmann sought editorial advice from Cohn, with whom he had set up an organisation on public education about pollination ecology and indigenous beekeeping practices.

Cohn, who had produced three other children’s books at that time, recounted, “Steve’s skills were in writing for adults and the story needed so much attention in terms of structure, story arc and character development that it was clear that the story needed to be transformed with a different ‘voice’ and that collaboration was necessary.”

She began by reading as much as possible about the Malaysian honey hunters, at the same time feeling her way into what a believable character would be for a young audience.

When she had a manuscript close to completion, she visited Pak Teh and the honey hunters, witnessing “the deep reverence of the honey hunters and the ceremonies associated with the honey hunt. I was graced with being able to see this ancient tradition.” She thereafter rewrote parts of the story.

Cohn’s agent then set them up with a publisher with whom she had worked, Cinco Puntos Press, who agreed to the very unusual step of accepting a manuscript with an artist. The final product, is proud testament to the hard work that went into it.

Last month, Dr Buchmann, accompanied by Prof Makhdzir and Mirocha, presented a copy of the book to Kedah’s Sultan Abdul Halim Mu’adzam Shah at the Anak Bukit Palace in Alor Star.

Certainly, the effort has pleased both Pak Teh and one of his grandsons who had inherited the tradition, Nizam Mustapha, 28.

“Seronok jugak (I feel happy),” cackled Pak Teh in his thick Kedah accent.

“I’m glad that people are doing this research,” chipped in Nizam. “If people don’t know about this, who knows, in 10 years, all this will be gone.”


The Bee Tree by Stephen Buchmann and Diana Cohn, and illustrated by Paul Mirocha, will be available soon in Malaysia. For more information, email Cinco Puntos Press (www.cincopuntos.com) at info@cincopuntos.com.

Mystery of world's biggest, yuckiest flower solved

Mystery of world's biggest, yuckiest flower solved By Will Dunham
Thu Jan 11, 3:29 PM ET



WASHINGTON (Reuters) - It's the world's biggest flower, and maybe the stinkiest, too. And now scientists have used genetic analysis to solve the long-standing mystery of the lineage of the rafflesia flower, known for its blood-red bloom measuring three feet (1 meter) wide and its nauseating stench of rotting flesh.


Writing in the journal Science on Thursday, a team of researchers said rafflesia -- discovered in an 1818 scientific expedition to a Sumatran rain forest -- comes from an ancient family of plants known not for big flowers, but for tiny ones.

In fact, many of its botanical cousins boast flowers just a few millimeters wide.

This family, called Euphorbiaceae, also includes the poinsettia, Irish bells and crops such as the rubber tree, castor oil plant and cassava shrub, the researchers said.

Rafflesia's many odd characteristics long had tripped up scientists trying to figure out where it fit on the botanical tree of life. It is sort of a botanical outlaw -- a parasitic plant that steals nutrients from another plant while deceiving insects into pollinating it.

"They really are a funky plant," Harvard University plant biologist Charles Davis, who led the research, said in an interview.

Rafflesia (pronounced rah-FLEEZ-ee-ah) lives inside the tissue of a tropical vine related to the grapevine, with only its flower visible. It is devoid of leaves, shoots and roots, and does not engage in photosynthesis, the process plants use to exploit the energy from sunlight.

Its flowers can weigh 15 pounds (7 kg). They are a blotchy blood red. They smell like decaying flesh. And they even can emit heat, perhaps mimicking a newly killed animal in order to entice the carrion flies that pollinate it.

'TOTALLY FETID'

"They really do look and smell like rotting flesh. They are a totally fetid, stinking, foul kind of flower. It can be totally repulsive to so many of us. But to the flies that visit these things, it's just delightful," Davis said.

There are various species of rafflesia growing on the floor of rain forests in parts of Southeast Asia, with Borneo the center of its diversity, Davis said.

Davis said its lineage dates back roughly 100 million years to the Cretaceous Period, the last act of the Age of Dinosaurs when flowering plants are believed to have first appeared. The researchers determined that over a span of 46 million years, rafflesia's flowers evolved a 79-fold increase in size before assuming a slower evolutionary pace.

Recent efforts to nail down plant lineages have relied on molecular markers in genes relating to photosynthesis, but that was not possible with rafflesia. The researchers had to scour other parts of its genome for clues.

"These plants are so bizarre that no matter where you put them with any group of plants, you're going to have a lot of explaining to do," Davis said. "But what was surprising was that with all of the options available as close relatives, they are nested within this group of plants with absolutely tiny flowers."

Southern Illinois University plant biologist Daniel Nickrent, who took part in the research, said this deeper understanding of rafflesia might aid people keen to develop larger flowers and fruits.

It was discovered on an expedition led by Sir Thomas Stamford Raffles, who founded the British colony of Singapore, and naturalist Joseph Arnold, who died of malaria on the trip.

Saving the tiger

Saving the tiger

The Malayan tiger is in a perilous but not hopeless state. The endangered species needs ample land, food and protection to flourish. Stories by TAN CHENG LI.

THE Malayan tiger was given “totally protected” status in 1976 – it could be hunted as a game species prior to that. But 30 years later, it remains in a perilous state.

Although the Department of Wildlife and National Parks (Perhilitan) insists that tiger numbers, around 500, are not dwindling and still form a viable population, threats have not really eased. Plantations and chainsaws eat away at wild habitats, poachers carry on their slaughter to feed the demand for tiger meat and parts, and we continue putting “rogue” tigers into cages.

If the Malayan tiger is to survive in the wild and avert a fate such as that of the Sumatran rhinos, whose numbers teeter at fewer than 100, they need help.


Tiger pelts and bones seized from a house in Johor Baru in 2003.
Answering the call is a group of government officials, wildlife managers, scientists and conservationists, who recently huddled together for three days at Perhilitan’s Biodiversity Centre in Lanchang, Pahang, to map out our most comprehensive tiger conservation plan – well, most comprehensive because all we had in the past were piecemeal schemes.

A key point that emerged from the meeting is that all is not lost for the Panthera tigris jacksoni. It may be in a perilous, but not hopeless, state.

With improved methods to gauge tiger numbers, a more positive picture has emerged, says wildlife biologist Dr Melvin Gumal. “In the 1990s, we portrayed tigers as being in crisis. But as we get more information, we find that there is potential to say ‘tigers forever’”.

But that hinges on providing them ample land and food, and protection from poachers and farmers. So the workshop ended with a draft plan that centres around these strategies: monitor and protect existing tiger populations in key areas; link up fragmented tiger habitats through forested corridors; eliminate or reduce threats; and minimise the loss of tigers at forest edges due to man-animal clashes.



Tiger refuge

Tiger biologist Dr Kae Kawanishi, whose work in Taman Negara since 1998 revealed a population of 50 to 80 big cats there, is convinced that Malaysia is one country where tigers will survive. Based on available forest habitat and prey species, she says Peninsular Malaysia can harbour some 1,500 tigers.

“The proposed action plan should promote the continued existence of wild landscapes with abundant prey and core protected zones, connected by areas of tiger-friendly rural development and forestry practice,” says Kawanishi.

Because the Malaysian rainforest lacks abundant prey such as the herds of deer seen in the grassy plains of India and Nepal, its tiger densities tend to be low, at one to three animals for every 100sqkm. So to support viable tiger populations, our wild reserves need to be large. And when we protect tigers, we shield all other wildlife.

Kawanishi singles out three “tiger conservation landscapes” or TCL, which are sites big enough and have the best chance of sustaining the species: the Main Range, Greater Taman Negara and the Southern Forest Complex.


Did this tiger, trapped last June, encroach into human territory or did humans encroach into its habitat?
Other forested areas such as state-owned forests, timber concessions, scrubland, riverine forest and agricultural plots, should not be omitted from the tiger protection plan since they too harbour tigers and other wildlife.

To safeguard tigers found outside protected reserves and wildlife sanctuaries, wildlife managers plan to rely on the National Physical Plan (NPP), as it will create the Central Forest Spine, a tract of forest traversing the length of the peninsula. Its function is to link isolated forests with sheltered reserves to form a larger green haven that will ultimately safeguard water catchments and biodiversity.

Although deemed a useful conservation tool, the NPP, however, has yet to prove its worth partly due to poor implementation. It may be a statutory document which must be complied with but state governments have ignored it. For instance, Perak is logging the Temenggor forest reserve, which the NPP listed as an “environmentally sensitive area”.

Furthermore, the document lacks specifics. So, where to place the forested corridors will entail more studies. Also, many forests have been earmarked for logging and development, thus hampering the Central Forest Spine plan.



Keeping tigers at bay

When plantations and livestock farms march right up to tiger country, attacks on humans and livestock – scientists call these “human-tiger conflict” – become inevitable. Three known conflict hotspots are Hulu Perak-Sungai Siput, Jeli-Kuala Krai-Gua Musang and Dungun-Kelantan. In cases of human fatalities, wildlife rangers have had to shoot the animal. Trapped tigers, meanwhile, end up in Malacca Zoo or Taiping Zoo, where they will forever remain captive.

To mitigate such conflicts, Perhilitan and World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) have worked with villagers in Jeli, Kelantan, and Jerangau Barat, Terengganu, relying on measures as simple as confining livestock in pens at night and keeping estates weed-free so that tigers have no hiding place. But many villages in conflict sites have not benefited from such attention as the projects depend on available funds.

In the long term, keeping plantations away from tiger territories as well as keeping a sizeable buffer between plantations and forests, seem the logical and easiest solutions – but this wise approach to landuse planning remains elusive.

Stressing the importance of buffers, Kelantan Perhilitan director Pazil Abdul Patah says such a zone will help prevent encroachment into wild areas. “Logging roads, for instance, often give easier access for poachers,” he says.

Often overlooked is the role of prey species in tiger conservation. Tigers could be venturing into plantations for their meals simply because the forest could no longer feed them. Their usual prey, the sambar deer and wild boars, could have been overhunted. This may be the case in Jeli, which saw 45 cases of tiger attacks between 1999 and 2004. Camera trapping work by WWF never captured any photos of deer although they are among the more common rainforest mammals.

A shrinking prey base may pose an even greater threat to tigers than loss of habitat and poaching. If tigers cannot feed themselves and their cubs, their numbers will surely plunge. Some studies have suggested that the loss of prey was what decimated the Bali, Caspian and Javan tigers. If indeed the same threat looms over the Malayan tiger, Perhilitan will have to consider ending legal game hunting.


Four of the 22 wild tigers in Malacca Zoo, destined to a life in captivity.
Halt the trade

With the South China tiger population almost decimated, poachers now target Malayan tigers to meet China’s unabated appetite for tiger meat and parts. Laws exist but the illegal trade will stop only when we muster the will to enforce them.

In a survey of 99 traditional medicine shops in the country in 2004, Traffic, a group that monitors the international wildlife trade, found over half offering products purporting to contain parts of protected wildlife, including the tiger’s.

“Many of these actually contain fake tiger products but they are fuelling demand for the real thing,” says Traffic programme officer Chris Shepherd.

Last year, Traffic found restaurants throughout the country serving wild meat, including tiger meat. Shepherd’s investigations in Laos reveal Malaysia to be a major source of wildlife. Dealers there claim to get supplies of pangolins, freshwater turtles, snakes, long-tailed macaques and tiger meat and parts from Malaysia.

Indeed, foreign poachers have been hard at work in our forests and parks. “We have found camps stocked with boxes of food and medical supplies. So you can imagine how long the poachers intend to stay in the forest,” says Perhilitan law and enforcement director Misliah Mohamad Basir.

Countering criticisms of poor policing by Perhilitan, she says scanty information has hampered enforcement work. But with the help of the Army, Perhilitan has nabbed 75 poachers (all Thais except for five Cambodians) since 2002.

Of the 3,612 violations of the Wildlife Protection Act 1972 between 2001 and 2005, only eight related to tigers. It is believed that most poaching goes undetected. Last June, Thai Police in Bangkok confiscated illegal wildlife parts, including the remains of six tigers, from the cargo of a Thai Airways flight from the Thai-Malaysian border town of Haadyai. Could the animals be ours? Misliah says no information could be obtained from Thai authorities.



Plan in action

Because of the multi-faceted threats, tiger survival lies not only within wildlife conservation agencies. Shepherd echoes a common view when he urges for more inter-agency co-operation: “Enforcement agencies other than Perhilitan, such as the Customs, should be vigilant against wildlife smuggling and view it as priority.”

Finally, we should be ruthless when dealing with poachers and violators. “Small fines and penalties aren’t deterrent,” says Shepherd.

The proposed tiger conservation plan reinstates what many know needs to be done to stop the slaughter of the Malayan tiger. But as always, the outcome depends on what exactly is put into action. Meanwhile, many other issues warrant attention: What do we do about tigers kept in zoos, theme parks and private menageries? Should Perhilitan issue permits for displays of tigers in shopping malls? Should we continue trapping “rogue” tigers and send them to zoos?

The future survival of the Malayan tiger hinges on us providing them with more than space, food and protection; we need to respect them as another species on earth, just like us.

How you can help
Support the conservation efforts of MNS, WWF and MYCAT.

Protect tiger habitat by opposing indiscriminate development and illegal logging of forests.

Do not buy tiger parts or products claiming to contain tiger parts or derivatives.

Do not patronise restaurants serving tiger meat or meat from illegally acquired species.

Do not support zoos, private collections or exhibitions that display illegally acquired animals.

Write to the authorities and the press opposing policy decisions that hamper tiger conservation.

Notify Perhilitan (% 03-9075 2872) if you have information on anyone selling or trapping tigers and other protected species, or trading in their parts and products.
Source: Malaysian Conservation Alliance for Tigers (MYCAT)




To learn more about tigers, go to: www.savethe tigerfund.org, www.21stcenturytiger.org, www.tigers.ca, www.felidae.org, www.savethetigerfund.org, www.21stcenturytiger.org and www.tigers.ca.

Dung-Ho

Cover story: Dung-Ho
07 Jan 2007


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A young researcher whose heart is as big as the animals she’s determined to save lets JESSICA LIM tag along on her unusual quest.

AFTER months of battling shin-high, leech-filled mud, dense undergrowth, wasps and a kind of poisonous tree sap that breaks skin into raw blisters, the petite girl squatted happily by the treasure she sought.
It was a shimmering, lustrous pile of elephant dung.
"Wow. Very fresh. So nice," said elephant researcher Cynthia Boon as she broke into a smile.

Boon pinched a bit of the human head-sized bolus and sniffed it.
The team whipped out their dung-assessing gear — a GPS reader, compass, measuring tape and identification tag — and began noting how far it was decayed, the size and exact location.
As coming too close to the actual animal is rather dangerous, Boon explained that the team keeps a safe distance and looks out for the next best indicator — its fibrous poop.
The data will be compiled and analysed under the country’s first nationwide elephant survey, called the CITES Monitoring the Illegal Killing of Elephants (MIKE) programme.
It is a Department of Wildlife and National Parks (Perhilitan) and Wildlife Conservation Society Malaysia project, sponsored in part by the US Fish and Wildlife Service.
It will find out how elephants are distributed in Malaysia, paving the way for a sorely needed elephant master plan.
The plan must strike the delicate balance between the needs of elephants and their human neighbours.
And the plan must be hatched soon, says Perhilitan. Nearly one in five wildlife conflicts reported to the department have to do with elephants.
This makes them second only to long-tailed macaques, which account for more than half. The department receives about 730 jumbo-related complaints a year.
"They may not be highest in the number of complaints, but they are definitely the most expensive wildlife conflict to handle," said Perhilitan’s Salman Saaban.
Salman, the senior assistant director of the department’s Biological Diversity Conservation Division, said that the cost of translocating a single elephant was RM41,000.
They have moved 336 elephants since 1974, an average of one per month.
"The truth is, we cannot say whether we’re putting too many elephants in one place. Maybe the area is over-full, we don’t know. That's why we need this study.
"Until this study is done, we’ll just have to translocate ‘problem’ elephants the way we always done."
It has been seven months since porcelain-skinned Boon, 26, traded the cushy comfort of her hometown in Kulai, Johor, for the dank, foreboding jungles of Taman Negara.
The only child of a contractor dad and hairdresser mum, Boon is one of three young women biologists who are leading teams of Orang Asli, local guides and wildlife rangers into the last of our country’s surviving elephant territories.
"They are our iron ladies," said programme co-ordinator Dr Jephte Sompud.
"We had people from all over the world apply for the job. Sad to say, none of the men had what it took.
"But these three, they’ve got the experience, they’ve got the guts and they’ve got the spirit."
The women only come out of the deep jungles once a month. When in there, they're unreachable by phone, exposed to all manner of wild beasts and surrounded mostly by men.
They sleep in tents and toilet is behind any thick clump of bushes.
The other two biologists, Nurul Fatana Samsuri and Nurulhuda Zakaria, both 23, declined to be photographed.
Their parents, confided Nurulhuda, had a tough time coming to terms with the fact that their darling daughters were risking their lives for hairy, trumpeting giants that could trample them without remorse.
In theory, the plan of action is simple.
First, the team asks local folk to point out where the elephants are. They follow the jumbo footsteps closely and take note of where they hang out.
They then take a huge grid map of the park and mark out systematic horizontal lines on areas within the animals' projected home range.
They must walk along these lines and count the pieces of poop they find.
"Ha, ha. That’s in theory," laughed the bubbly Boon.
Those transect lines, so neat on paper, are very rarely that straightforward on the ground.
"There is no trail to follow, and whether it’s a raging river, a 60-degree incline, or an area infested with semut api (fiery fire ants), the team has to take one determined step after the another to cover the two kilometres.
Recently, after a two-day hike into the park from the Taman Negara Merapoh entrance, Boon and her two Orang Asli guides, Mat Daling and Soufi, stood at the base of an almost vertical incline.
According to their predetermined markings on the map, they were supposed to scale it.
Their progress for the past two hours had been slow. The two young locals had worked non-stop, furiously chopping a path through tangled and thorny undergrowth.
Often, all that stood between them and a death-inviting plunge into the ravine below were some scraggly trees which they clung to for dear life.
And now, scratched, muddy, exhausted and not even halfway into the transect, they were stuck.
A detour to the left and right confirmed that the rock face went on indefinitely. An attempt to clamber up the incline brought down a shower of rocks.
And they hadn’t found a single piece of dung.
What more, rain clouds had gathered ominously. Boon’s left big toe-nail, which had developed a persistent fungus from the constant damp conditions, was torn and throbbing.
"It’s all right," said Boon — a phrase that would be repeated many times over the next few days, weeks and months.
She adjusted her cap and glasses and joked: "It’s not wasted. At least we know there are no elephants here. The only reason an elephant would climb up there is to commit suicide."


Jumbo-sized shoes to fill

COMPLETELY blind in one eye, with vision fading fast in the other, the 70-plus-year-old elephant was glad her employers finally gave her the golden trunk-shake.
Towards the end of her working life, the old dame could hardly walk in a straight line anymore. Mountains, once easy walking, now drained her too easily.
Her keepers said they even saw tears in her eyes when she was gently pushed to deliver her services for one more day.
Mek Bunga the guide elephant would have liked to retire much earlier, but she was an expert in her field. There was just too much work to do and no one to do it.
She is the go-between, pacifier and big momma to frisky younger elephants who have been plucked out of their jungle homes and planted in new ones.
When an elephant persistently disrupts villages, the best strategy so far is to sedate them, transport them over miles of land and sea, and help them adapt to a more food-abundant area, said the Department of Wildlife and National Park’s (Perhilitan) Salman Saaban.
The senior assistant director of the department’s Biological Conservation Division said the job needed two trained elephants to sandwich the sedated wild one as it stumbled though deep jungles inaccessible by land transport.
To discourage the wild elephant from finding its way home, the animal is usually transported over bodies of water, like in the Tasik Kenyir area or in the Belum Forest.
Every year, 12 to 14 elephants are translocated.
Now that Mek Bunga the matriarch has been let loose to contentedly chew greens in the Kuala Gandah Elephant Sanctuary, there are only two guides left and they’re both over 60 years old.
And Lokimalar and Che Mek, says Perhilitan’s Siti Hawa Yatim, may have less than a year to go before they find their job too demanding.
"Without these guide elephants, translocation would be impossible. Don’t tell me you want to pull the elephants yourself!" said Siti Hawa, the department's Biodiversity Conservation Division director.
"Besides, the trained elephants also comfort the new one. It will think ‘hey, at least I got gang here’."
The department had relied on Mek Bunga and Che Mek, both Thai elephants, since adopting this strategy in 1976. Indian-born Lokimalar was roped in recently to take the place of ailing Mek Bunga.
A younger elephant from Myanmar, Myan Thon Pian, was thought to be able to fill the gigantic shoes, but the plan didn’t work.
"The senior elephants rejected Myan Thon Pian. We don’t know why. They just refused to co-operate. It’s not that simple."

National Elephant Conservation Centre’s Nasharuddin Othman said it wasn’t easy to come by trained elephants, and training local ones was out of the question.
"In Thailand, they have domesticated elephants for 2,000 years," said Nasharuddin.
"An elephant needs to be tame for at least eight generations before it can be trained to do this kind of work. Our elephants are very wild."
The situation is getting desperate, said Siti Hawa. The department had been trying for one year to get in new ones, but efforts have not been fruitful so far.