Research Partnership with Developing Countries
A Programme funded by Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF) and Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC)

Building Indonesia's Research Capacity for Orangutan Conservation Biology

Orangutans are in steep decline. The International Conservation Union (IUCN) has designated the Bornean orangutan as endangered and the Sumatran as critically endangered. Their populations are threatened by habitat conversion, especially to establish oil palm plantations, by uncontrolled logging in forests, and by capture for the pet market. To prevent their extinction, more effective conservation measures are needed. However, Indonesia has a limited technical capacity to design effective orangutan conservation measures. For instance, reserves have been established, but often do not include a region's major orangutan habitats. Reintroduction is legally mandated, but it is not known what criteria make areas suitable for reintroduction. The Indonesian government has requested support from the scientific community. The aim of this program is to support the PhD education of three promising Indonesian scientists, advised by joint Swiss?Indonesian academic supervisor teams. These students will temporarily join the Anthropological Institute and Museum of the University of Zurich. The results of these projects will be fed back to the policy makers, but more importantly, the expertise and experts generated will enable Indonesia to help implement its national orangutan action plan. The first project will identify the genetic discontinuities among wild orangutan populations to identify the most appropriate management units. To optimize conservation, one should have one viable population in each conservation management unit. Moreover, animals should always be reintroduced into areas inside the same management unit. The present taxonomy of orangutans in two species, one on each island, and with subspecies only recognized for Borneo, does not adequately capture the genetic variation. However, some areas, especially on Borneo, have not been sampled at all, and this information is needed to draw up proper conservation management units. The second project will assess stress levels of individual orangutans in disturbed and reintroduced populations relative to undisturbed ones to evaluate their wellbeing. Assessing stress levels is probably the most direct way to evaluate the extent to which orangutans cope with various disturbances: habitat degradation, habitat fragmentation, lack of familiarity with a particular habitat following release, and exposure to humans in animals living in marginal habitat near humans. These stress measures give us a more immediate indicator of success than survival. The third project will assess the factors limiting the success of individuals that were reintroduced (ex?captives) or translocated (animals caught because they lost their habitat).

Contacts

Professor Carel van Schaik
Anthropologisches Institut und Museum
Universität Zürich-Irchel
Winterthurerstrasse 190
CH-8057 Zürich
v.schaik(at)aim.uzh.ch

Joko Pamungkas
Primate Research Center
Bogor Agricultural University
Jalan Lodaya II/5
ID-16151 Bogor
jpi-pssp(at)indo.net.id