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Malaysia’s Minister of Plantations and Raw Materials, Johari Abdul Ghani, https://twitter.com/joharighani/status/1787859138367864903 that the country will begin to give away orangutans to countries that purchase palm oil, used in the industrial production of many consumer goods, from Nutella to lipsticks.
The plan has been defined as “orangutan diplomacy” and, according to the minister, should convince palm oil importing countries that Malaysia is committed to the sustainability of production and at the same time wants to protect the country’s ecosystem. With this plan, Malaysia intends to counter the bad reputation that palm oil has in many Western countries: it is in fact produced in plantations which are partly located in areas previously occupied by rainforests, the main habitat of orangutans and many other animal species and vegetables. “Malaysia must not take a defensive stance on palm oil. Instead, it must show the world that it is a sustainable palm oil producer and that it is committed to protecting forests and environmental sustainability,” Ghani said.
However, Malaysian environmental organizations have criticized the plan: in a statement to Reuters the local branch of the WWF has called for the government to establish protected wildlife corridors for orangutans and an end to the conversion of forests into plantations. The organization said it prefers orangutan conservation in Malaysia and calls for commercial partners “to be brought to Malaysia to support the initiative, rather than sending orangutans out of the country.”
Orangutans, also called orangutan from the words in the Malay language that mean “man of the forest”, they are large monkeys that live on the islands of Borneo (divided between Malaysia and Indonesia) and Sumatra (entirely Indonesian). They are divided into three different species, all at serious risk of extinction: the one that lives in Borneo (Pongo pygmaeus) and which would possibly be affected by the Malaysian “orangutan diplomacy”, has around 105 thousand individuals in nature (the other two species are much less numerous).
Indonesia (with 59 percent of global production) and Malaysia (with 24 percent) are by far the world’s leading producers and exporters of palm oil. For the two countries the activity is an important source of revenue, but controversies over the risks to human health and the environment linked to its consumption and trade have led to a negative perception regarding its use.
– Read also: Is palm oil bad for you?
In recent years, the growing demand from the food industry has led to an unprecedented expansion of cultivation: especially in Indonesia, farmers set fire to large portions of forests to create new fields. Over the years the effects of this practice have been devastating, with enormous fires and the production of very dense smoke: in addition to the burning of trees, the burning of undecomposed plant remains (peat) in the soil of the Indonesian plains releases clouds of methane, of carbon, ozone and gases such as ammonium cyanide. Furthermore, fires and the conversion of forests into plantations have severely fragmented the orangutan habitat, putting the survival of many populations at risk.
(AP Photo/Achmad Ibrahim)
Last year the European Union approved a regulation to prevent products obtained thanks to deforestation in countries where tropical forests grow from being marketed in member countries: in some cases, these could include Malaysian palm oil. To encourage exports to the European Union and other countries that consume a lot of palm oil, including China, the Malaysian government has therefore thought of “orangutan diplomacy”. The name is an explicit reference to China’s “panda diplomacy”, which lends giant pandas to countries with which it has good relations for species conservation programs, and on the contrary requests them back when relations worsen.
According to some estimates cited by South China Morning Post, pandas are the favorite animals of those who visit the zoos in which they live and in this sense therefore also their main attraction. Orangutans are probably a little less attractive, but they are still appreciated for their characteristic appearance (they have reddish fur and adult males have large crests of skin on the sides of their faces) and for their intelligence: they are capable of using rudimentary tools and in the past some were trained to imitate human behaviors.
– Read also: This orangutan healed his own wound
