Great Ape Trust?s Wich lead author of Oryx paper on continuing orangutan population declines

Read the press release from the Great Ape Trust. (pdf file)

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Nutella, with this deforestation you are really spoiling us

Greenpeace is working to build a coalition of companies which are determined to reform the palm oil industry so no more forest is lost due to the expansion of their plantations in South East Asia. With Unilever’s help they’re in contact with other major players in the palm oil trade. However, some are less keen than others to co-operate and need some persuading.

Email Ferrero, the makers of Nutella and tell them that destroying rainforests to make chocolate spread has to stop (link takes you to Greenpeace UK’s website)

One such company is Ferrero, makers of Nutella and of course Ferrero Rocher. It is another large user of palm oil and one that has already been the focus of attention for our Italian office. They analysed the ingredients of Nutella and it contained 31 per cent vegetable oil, and much of that is palm oil.

Despite repeated requests from Greenpeace campaigners, Ferrero refused to reveal the names of its palm oil suppliers whilst saying it’s dealing with the issue through its membership of the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil. But as I’ve mentioned in the past, as things stand this organisation isn’t living up to its name and some of its members are actively involved in deforestation.

After sending a buffoonery of orang-utans, not to the ambassador’s reception but to persuade the Italian football team to support the campaign (Nutella is a major team sponsor) and more than 9,000 of emails sent from Italian Greenpeace supporters, Ferrero still refuses to spill the beans.

It’s still at the stage where Ferrero could be taking a lead on this, but without being honest and transparent about the source of its palm oil, Ferrero can’t even begin to tackle the problem. So we’re asking you to email Pietro and Giovanni Ferrero, the joint CEOs of Ferrero, and tell them that their company has to join Unilever in supporting a moratorium on deforestation for palm oil.

Source: Greenpeace UK Blog

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MUST READ: Planet of the Apes Has Arrived, and It Is Spain

Learn more and see some great photos of Copito de Nieve (a.k.a. Snowflake) at mongabay.com

An editorial by Nikolas Kozloff, special to mongabay.com

Visiting Spain’s Barcelona zoo as a child, I was greeted to a memorable sight. In one of the cages sat a gorilla, but not just any primate. I had come face to face with the legendary albino ape “Little Snowflake.” Because of Snowflake’s white coat, when I looked at him I felt like I was peering into the eyes of a wizened old man. The only difference was that Snowflake’s eyes were pink!

Snowflake (known as Copito de Nieve in Spanish) had a small outside enclosure where he could romp and play with several female apes as well as his offspring which, unlike him, were non-albino. At least the apes had a place to stretch their legs outside, though unfortunately the enclosure was surrounded by concrete walls. There were no trees, just a couple of structures with metal bars from which Snowflake and his new family could hang from.

Though Snowflake was a source of endless fascination for thousands of Spanish children, few paused to consider the ape’s tragic story and the deplorable circumstances surrounding his capture. In 1966, a local farmer in Equatorial Guinea (at the time a Spanish colony) saw Snowflake outside his village and killed all the rest of the poor ape’s family, who were charcoal in color. Terrorized, Snowflake clung to his mother’s neck and buried his head in her fur. Copito, the only albino gorilla known to man, was later purchased by a Catalan primatologist, Jordi Sabater.

In Barcelona, Snowflake became a national sensation. Mentioned in tourist guides and put on postcards, he became a popular mascot for Barcelona. During his life at the zoo, Copito fathered 22 offspring (6 survived to adulthood) with three females, and lived to see his grandchildren. In 2001 he began to suffer from a rare form of skin cancer, possibly related to his albinism. Thousands visited the zoo to say goodbye to Copito before he was finally euthanized in November, 2003. Though Copito lived longer than the average Western Lowland Gorilla, this can hardly make up for the substandard living conditions at the zoo not to mention the horrific story of his capture.

A Legal Breakthrough

Fortunately, Spain is now seeking to make amends for its historic lack of regard toward primates. Last week, the country’s parliament voiced its support for the rights of great apes (which include gorillas, chimpanzees, and orangutans) to life and freedom. It’s the first time any national legislature has called for such rights for non-humans and represents a great breakthrough. “This is a historic day in the struggle for animal rights and in defense of our evolutionary comrades, which will doubtless go down in the history of humanity,” said Pedro Pozas, an animal rights advocate.

Pozas is the Spanish director of the Great Apes Project, a Seattle-based organization which started up in 1993. The group was founded by philosophers Peter Singer and Paola Cavalieri, who argued that “non-human hominids” like chimpanzees, gorillas, orangutans and bonobos should enjoy the right to life, freedom and not to be tortured. Pozas and his colleagues have long argued that great apes share more than genetically similar DNA with their human counterparts. According to the organization’s own Web site, “They [apes] enjoy a rich emotional and cultural existence in which they experience emotions such as fear, anxiety and happiness. They share the intellectual capacity to create and use tools, learn and teach other languages. They remember their past and plan for their future.” Such claims have been bolstered by an enormous amount of data collected by scientists such as Jane Goodall, Diane Fossey and Birute Galdikas.

The new resolutions have cross-party, majority support in parliament and are expected to become law. The government therefore is now committed to update the statute book within a year to outlaw harmful experiments on apes in Spain. “We have no knowledge of great apes being used in experiments in Spain, but there is currently no law preventing that from happening,” Pozas remarked. Keeping apes for circuses, television commercials or filming will be forbidden and breaking the new laws will become an offence under Spain’s penal code. Though keeping Spain’s estimated 315 apes in zoos will still be legal, conditions will have to improve in many facilities in order to comply with the new law. Animal rights activists claim that 70 per cent of apes in Spanish zoos currently live in sub-human conditions.

The political momentum for ape legislation has been building for some time. In 2007 the Spanish Balearic Islands, a popular tourist destination located in the western Mediterranean, approved a similar resolution to grant legal rights to great apes. The Balearic legislation did not provide “human rights” to apes, though it did recognize basic legal protections supported by biological and scientific evidence that great apes experience an emotional and intellectual conscience similar to that of human children. By declaring its support for fundamental rights for great apes, the Balearic Parliament established an important legal precedent that primates were conscious, self-aware beings that should not be tortured, abused and neglected.

Both legislative efforts are significant in that they represent an important step toward future governmental support for great apes worldwide. Under most government structures, legal rights are the only way to insure that non-human great apes are free from torture, unnecessary death and capture; simple “animal protection” laws are not enough.

Why Spain?

On the face of it, Spain is hardly the first place in the world that one would expect to take up breakthrough animal rights legislation. In the eighteenth century the Enlightenment didn’t have much of an ideological impact upon Spain. In the early nineteenth century, when Napoleon invaded the Iberian nation, French forces were not greeted as liberators but as oppressors. In the twentieth century Spain saw the emergence of a strong left political movement but it was quickly liquidated by the fascist general Francisco Franco. For forty years, Spaniards lived under military dictatorship and the stultifying and backward influence of the Catholic Church. Conservative rule continued even after the country returned to democracy: until recently, Spain was governed by José María Aznar, who had reorganized Spanish conservatives into the People’s Party (Partido Popular or PP). Aznar’s grandfather served as Franco’s ambassador to Morocco and the United Nations and his father was a pro-Franco journalist. Despite robust public opposition to the war in Iraq, Aznar supported Bush’s 2003 invasion by contributing 1,300 Spanish peacekeeping troops. In part the PP owed its popularity due to its tough stand on terrorism and the Basque separatist group ETA.

Then, three days prior to the March, 2004 presidential election bombings of Madrid commuter trains killed 201 people and injured 1,500. The PP hastily blamed ETA for the bombings but as suspicions grew of al Qaeda involvement Aznar’s party suffered. Some analysts argued that the PP held some responsibility for the Madrid bombings because it sent troops to Iraq and acquiesced in U.S. foreign policy. Thousands poured out on to the streets to protest the PP. José Luís Rodríguez Zapatero (the leader of the Partido Socialista Obrero Español, PSOE or Spanish Socialists’ Workers Party) pulled off an incredible upset electoral victory.

The socialists quickly shifted away from the strongly pro-U.S. focus of the PP. Zapatero described Spain’s participation in the Iraq war as “a total error.” In May, two months after his electoral victory, Zapatero withdrew Spanish troops. In opposing the Bush White House, Zapatero shared some ideological affinity with Hugo Chávez of Venezuela (for more on these questions see my recent book Revolution! South America and the Rise of the New Left).

You can’t really understand the rise of Zapatero however in purely political terms. Today, Spain is in the midst of tremendous cultural ferment and the socialists are taking on once sacrosanct institutions like the Catholic Church with a vengeance. Indeed, it might be said that Spain is presently one of the most socially dynamic and politically progressive countries in Europe. In short order, Zapatero has legalized gay marriage, reduced the influence of the Catholic Church in education and set up an Equality Ministry. That’s saying a lot, in light of the fact that Spain only legalized divorce in the 1980s.

Catholics and Socialists Spar over Bullfighting

Even before parliament voted over the ape question, another controversy of sorts had erupted over bullfighting. Public appetite for this cruel blood sport has long been on the decline, but that hasn’t stopped the Spanish government from heavily subsidizing the industry. Over 550 million Euros of Spanish taxpayer money is provided to the bullfighting industry per year, even though Spanish state broadcaster RTVE stopped live coverage of bullfights in August 2007 because the blood sport was judged too violent for children.

Recent Gallup polls indicate that 72 per cent of Spaniards lack interest in bullfighting and just 7 per cent say they are very interested. In Catalonia more than 80 per cent of the population shares no interest at all. In 2007, anti-bullfighting campaigners rejoiced when RTVE stopped live coverage of this barbaric “sport.” Theo Oberhuber, a coordinator of Ecologists in Action, which had been campaigning for a total ban, said: “This is not a total victory but it opens the door to the beginning of the end. We are very pleased.”

Though the Spanish public wants to turn the page on its brutal and backward past, the forces of reaction have lined up against the animal rights lobby. Predictably, it has been the PP which has taken up the gauntlet. The conservative party of Aznar has attacked RTVE’s new programming policy, while Zapatero is thought to disapprove of bullfighting. The Spanish Prime Minister has never made his views publicly known but his Environment Minister Cristina Narbona has said that Spain should stage bullfights without killing the animals.

Debating Apes’ Rights

With the public mood increasingly turning hostile against blood sport, animal rights activists grew more optimistic about their future prospects. Campaigners may have benefited from some curious political timing: some philosophers believed that the deadly Madrid bombings in March, 2004 forced a radical rethink within society. “The Madrid bombing made many people think about the consequences of selfishly letting one’s compatriots act wrongly,” remarked philosopher Paula Casal, Executive Director of the Great Ape Project. “(Spain’s) new president, (José Luís Rodríguez) Zapatero, counts on passionate support for all his radical political changes, and determination to tackle even our oldest vices,” she added.

Once again it was members of the PP, now backed by the Catholic Church, which came out most vociferously against the idea of extending legal protections to apes. The archbishop of Pamplona and Tudela, Fernando Sebastián, said that only a “ridiculous or distorted society” could propose such legislation. “We don’t give rights to some people — such as unborn children, human embryos, and we are going to give them to apes,” the archbishop remarked. The Church was reportedly concerned about the new law because the measure would undermine an anthropocentric world view and thereby call into question the special status of human beings. Meanwhile the PP complained that the resolution sought to give animals the same rights as humans ? something that the Socialist Government has denied. A senior PP member, Arturo Esteban, called the proposal an “act of moral poverty.”

Reactions to the parliamentary vote have been mixed. Many Spaniards were perplexed that the country should consider apes a priority when the economy is slowing sharply and Spain has been rocked by violent fuel protests. Others thought it was a strange decision, given that Spain has no wild apes of its own. Some critics have justifiably questioned why Spain has provided legal protection from death or torture to great apes but not to bulls.

A Philosophical Milestone

While Pozas hasn’t denied these fundamental contradictions, he believes that the vote will nevertheless set an important precedent by establishing legal rights for other animals. “We are seeking to break the species barrier ? we are just the point of the spear,” he said.

Having been successful in Spain, animal rights advocates will now be encouraged to press for similar measures in other European countries. Indeed, such efforts have been picking up steam for the last fifteen years. In 1992, Switzerland amended its constitution to allow animals to be considered “beings” and not things. A decade later, German legislators voted to add the words “and animals” to a constitutional clause obliging the state to respect and protect the dignity of human beings.

Writing in the normally right wing National Review, political scientist Richard Stevens praised the audacity of the Spanish legislation. “After a quiescence lasting half a millennium, Spain has distinguished itself by a return to the legal genius demonstrated by Francisco de Vitoria [a Spanish theologian best remembered for his defense of the rights of the Indians of the New World against Spanish colonists and for his ideas of the limitations of justifiable warfare] and Francisco Suarez in the 16th century [a Spanish theologian and philosopher, a founder of international law, often considered the most prominent Scholastic philosopher after St. Thomas Aquinas, and the major theologian of the Roman Catholic order known as the Society of Jesus or Jesuits].

“The genius of the Spaniards,” Stevens added, “is evidenced by their abandonment of the Aristotelian claptrap holding that what distinguishes man from the brutes is that man is endowed with logos, that is, reasoned speech that enables him to question the good and the bad, the just and the unjust, and the noble and the base. What Aristotle in his ignorance misses has been shown by modern science, namely, that the great apes and men have nearly identical DNA.”

Another legal expert, Thomas Rose of the University of Western Ontario, has also addressed the ethical dimensions of the Spanish decision. Writing for the online edition of the Canadian Broadcast Corporation he wrote “Apes are even capable of learning to communicate in another language and teach it to their offspring. In other words, apes are conscious, self-aware beings, just like humans. But does that mean they deserve to be granted personhood? Well, why not? Consider that under most international law corporations are recognized as legal persons and are granted many of the same rights humans enjoy, the right to sue, to vote and to freedom of speech. What enables an inanimate object like a corporation to enjoy personhood is a nicety called a legal fiction. A legal fiction is something assumed in law to be fact, irrespective of the truth or accuracy of that assumption. Corporate personhood is recognized the world over, so why not ape personhood? More than 2,000 years after Aristotle declared that Mother Nature had made all animals for the sake of humankind, that assumption might soon be stood on its head.”

Nikolas Kozloff is the author of Revolution! South America and The Rise of The New Left (Palgrave-Macmillan, 2008)

Learn more and see some great photos of Copito de Nieve (Snowflake) at mongabay.com

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Southeast Asia: Alternative sources of energy

Due to skyrocketing oil prices, many Southeast Asian countries are intensifying efforts to tap alternative sources of energy. Even oil producing countries like Malaysia, Indonesia and Brunei are investing on renewable energy.

Use of alternative energy is expected and necessary. Recent fuel hikes have caused widespread protests in Malaysia and Indonesia. Expensive oil is also exacerbating the economic crisis in the region, which is still burdened by rising food prices.

Lifestyles are changing since people are now more aware about the oil price crisis. Tree Maple reports that a green complex will soon rise in Singapore. The eco-complex will make good use of alternative energy sources. Tumelor writes about the plan of the Bangkok Metropolitan Administration to use wind turbines for the electricity requirement of public park lights.

The largest company of consumer products of Thailand has announced its plan to reduce oil consumption by 1 percent this year, using solar energy. Rambling Librarian hopes some day solar energy (through energy-efficient batteries) will power some of the household appliances.

Asiabiofuels?s Weblog notes that state-owned plantation firms have jointly set up a consortium for the construction of a biodiesel plant in Indonesia. While opposition to the use of biofuels is growing in the world, blogger The Poisoned is supporting it. In a related issue, Orangutan Outreach points out that the palm oil industry in Indonesia is causing of local conflicts, displacement, homelessness and morbidity.

Geothermal energy has a lot of potential in the region, especially in the Philippines and Indonesia. A study explains that ?both countries are in the so-called Pacific Ring of Fire, an area peppered with volcanoes and home to the world?s biggest reservoir of geothermal power.?

Visit the source of this article to read more:
http://globalvoicesonline.org/2008/07/03/southeast-asia-alternative-sources-of-energy/

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Wild Orangutan Declining More Sharply In Sumatra And Borneo Than Thought

ScienceDaily (July 3, 2008) ? Endangered wild orangutan (Pongo spp.) populations are declining more sharply in Sumatra and Borneo than previously estimated, according to new findings published this month by Great Ape Trust of Iowa scientist Dr. Serge Wich and other orangutan conservation experts in Oryx ? The International Journal of Conservation.

Conservation action essential to survival of orangutans, found only on the islands of Sumatra and Borneo, must be region-specific to address the different ecological threats to each species, said Wich and his co-authors, a pre-eminent group of scientists, conservationists, and representatives of governmental and non-governmental groups. They convened in Jakarta, Indonesia, in January 2004 to address the threats to orangutan survival and develop new assessment models to guide conservation planning.

New orangutan population estimates revealed in the July issue of Oryx reflect those improvements in assessment methodology ? including standardized data collection, island-wide surveys, and better sharing of data among stakeholders ? rather than dramatic changes in the number of surviving orangutans.

The experts? revised estimates put the number of Sumatran orangutans (P. abelii) around 6,600 in 2004. This is lower than previous estimates of 7,501 as a result of new findings that indicate that a large area in Aceh that was previously thought to contain orangutans actually does not. Since forest loss in Aceh has been relatively low from 2004 to 2008, the 2004 estimate is probably not much higher than the actual number in 2008. The 2004 estimate of about 54,000 Bornean orangutans (P. pygmaeus) is probably also higher than the actual number today as there has been a 10 percent orangutan habitat loss in the Indonesian part of Borneo during that period.

?It is clear that the Sumatran orangutan is in rapid decline and unless extraordinary efforts are made soon, it could become the first great ape species to go extinct,? Wich et al. wrote. ?Although these revised estimates for Borneo are encouraging, forest loss and associated loss of orangutans are occurring at an alarming rate, and suggest that recent reductions of Bornean orangutan populations have been far more severe than previously supposed.?

The new numbers underscore important issues in orangutan conservation. With improved sharing of data and deeper collaborations among stakeholders, the experts determined that 75 percent of all orangutans live outside of national parks, which have been severely degraded by illegal logging, mining, encroachment by palm oil plantations and fires due to a general lack of enforcement by regulatory authorities, who are either unable or reluctant to implement conservation management strategies.

However, some recent conservation successes ? keyed on political and financial support, media attention and advocacy by conservationists ? offer cause for cautious optimism that illegal logging in protected areas can be effectively reduced and improved management of protected areas can be attained, according to the experts.

?It is essential that conservation measures are taken to protect orangutans outside national parks, and these measures will by necessity be specific to each region,? Wich et al. wrote.

The experts reported positive signs that forest conservation is gaining prominence as a political agenda. For example, habitat loss has stabilized in some parts of Sumatra with a temporary logging moratorium in the province of Nanggroe Aceh Darussalam, where most of the island?s orangutans occur, both in and out of national parks. Opportunities also exist to develop reduced-impact logging systems on the island of Borneo, where most orangutans live in forests already exploited for timber.

Although other threats to orangutan survival exist, such as hunting in agricultural areas where human-orangutan conflicts exist, the biggest by far is forest destruction associated with the burgeoning palm oil industry in Indonesia and Malaysia. Together, they are the world?s largest palm oil producers with a combined global market share of 80.5 percent. Rapid expansion of the palm oil industry coupled with poor land-use planning are further pressuring forests and the orangutans who depend on them for survival.

For example, in Sumatra, the controversial Ladia Galaska road project in the Leuser Ecosystem will, unless halted, fragment two of the three largest remaining orangutan populations, Wich et al. wrote. A similar project in 1982 split the Gunung Leuser National Park, and the improved access facilitated uncontrolled illegal settlements inside the park, large-scale illegal encroachment and logging, and poaching of threatened species. Also cited as an example of faulty land-use planning was a mega rice project, funded primarily by Indonesia?s reforestation fund, which eliminated 10,000 square kilometers of peat swamp forest and killed an estimated 15,000 orangutans from 1996 to 1999.

?Both are examples of ill-advised projects with few benefits to local economies but major environmental costs,? Wich et al. wrote. ?However, as such projects provide substantial revenue for a small group of individuals with considerable political influence, unprecedented political will is needed to prevent similar projects in the future.?

The experts? report includes sweeping recommendations for:

• Effective law enforcement and prosecution to stop hunting orangutans for food and trade;
• Mechanisms to mitigate and reduce human-orangutan conflict in agricultural areas, including large-scale plantations;
• The development of an auditing process to assess the compliance of forestry concessions to their legal obligation to ensure orangutans are not hunted in concession areas;
• Increased environmental awareness at the local level, following examples set by the Sumatran Orangutan Conservation Program and the Kinabatangan Orangutan Conservation Project that promote awareness of conservation of forests and the importance of biodiversity;
• Development of mechanisms to monitor orangutan populations and forest cover, building on those in place on both Borneo and Sumatra;
• Continuation of surveys in less explored regions; and
• Continued improvement of survey methodology to include nest-decay rates.

?All efforts to monitor orangutans, however, will be to no avail unless the decline in numbers is halted, and this requires a change in political will,? Wich et al wrote. ?It is essential that funding for environmental services reaches the local level and that there is strong law enforcement. Developing a mechanism to ensure these occur is the challenge for the conservation of orangutans.?

Great Ape Trust Director of Conservation Dr. Benjamin Beck said the paper makes a significant contribution to orangutan conservation discussion.

?First, we have an unambiguous, scientifically rigorous answer when regulators and policymakers ask us how many orangutans really remain, and how that compares to historical population sizes,? Beck said. ?Those responsible for environmental stewardship cannot hide indecisively behind purported scientific uncertainty.

?Second, those answers are the results of pooled knowledge of nearly two dozen high-profile investigators who set aside their own professional reputations and agendas to collect data in a standardized format and share the results for a very high, common priority: the literal survival of the species that they study and love,? Beck continued. ?In addition to being a critical contribution to orangutan conservation, this paper is an exemplar of collaboration among conservation scientists and practitioners.?

Dr. Rob Shumaker, director of orangutan research at Great Ape Trust, said Wich?s paper is historically important and verifies the crisis situation for wild orangutans. ?This represents enormous amounts of work from the authors and demonstrates their commitments to the science of orangutan conservation,? he said. ?It?s a particularly notable achievement for Dr. Wich and continues his extraordinary dedication to the study of orangutans.

?It is my fervent hope that these data inspire action on the part of everyone who can positively affect orangutan conservation.?

In addition to his responsibilities at Great Ape Trust, Wich is co-manager of orangutan research at Sumatra?s Ketambe Research Center, one of the longest-running orangutan field study sites in the world.

Source: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/07/080703113628.htm

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Great Ape Trust emerges stronger after Floods of 2008

Floods of 2008 test young organization’s mettle

DES MOINES, IOWA, Jul. 3 -/E-Wire/– The founder of Great Ape Trust of Iowa says the Floods of 2008 tested the mettle of the organization like no other event in its brief history, but it has emerged stronger than ever.

“The entire Trust team performed heroically,” said Ted Townsend, who announced the now internationally known scientific research institute in 2002. “When ?our time’ came, everyone responded with heartfelt professionalism, personal sacrifice and tireless dedication. I could not be more proud of their effort, values, efficiency and results. This reminder of Mother Nature’s supremacy has forged a lasting spirit of unity and bonding throughout our campus. The Trust is stronger than ever.”

Floodwaters have receded enough on Great Ape Trust of Iowa’s southeast Des Moines campus that caretakers and scientists can shuttle to the ape residences in their cars and load supplies on a flatbed trailer hitched to a tractor, rather than transport everyone and everything by boat. Power has been restored to the orangutan home, and its return is imminent in the bonobo home. The level of water has dropped about 12 feet since June 10-13, when the runaway Des Moines River spilled across the 230-acre campus, and the gummy sludge left in the water’s place is drying. A dozen or more pair of hip waders have been retired.

These are the latest flood-recovery victories at Great Ape Trust, a scientific research center studying ape intelligence, language and behavior. They go a long way toward eliminating some of the inconveniences faced by the Great Ape Trust staff in the aftermath of record flooding that, at its peak, left every inch of the southeast Des Moines campus affected, swallowing some parts in as much as 12 feet of water.

As important as they are, the gradual return of people comforts can’t compete with the sight of the orangutan Azy somersaulting across fresh, sweet-smelling straw and exploring the upper reaches of the outdoor enclosure when he, Knobi and Allie accessed their outdoor enclosure for the first time in 11 days on June 23. Nor can improvements in the quality of the animal care staff’s life compare with the upcoming reintroduction of bonobos in their “greenhouse” - Great Ape Trust lingo for sunroom - where they work with researchers.

A week after the floodwaters seeped in, ape homes were “as clean as the day we moved into them,” said Dr. Rob Shumaker, director of orangutan research. “As far as the apes are concerned, we are 100 percent back to normal.”

Ape well-being is - and was throughout the flood emergency - the top priority of Great Ape Trust employees, who stood thigh-high or deeper in floodwaters as they worked around the clock to manage water inside the ape homes at levels ensuring maximum stability for the buildings’ floating concrete slabs. Fueling and monitoring pumps, while simultaneously tending to the apes’ needs, meant the bonobos and orangutans remained safe and dry on the upper levels of their vertical homes, designed to simulate apes’ natural environments.

“The orangutans’ hands and feet,” Shumaker said proudly, “never touched water.”

Said Director of Bonobo Research William M. Fields: “The main inconveniences were to people.”

Restoring the campus to pre-flood condition is expected to take months. Preliminary estimates put damages and losses at several hundred-thousand dollars. Specifically, four modular administrative suites, which provided workspaces for the administrative, scientific research, public safety and technology staffs, are a complete loss. Those employees are working from a nearby private home, which The Trust leases for visiting scientists and other guests, or remotely from other locations. Damage to the orangutan home was minor, primarily affecting electrical outlets and major appliances, all of which have been replaced. The mechanical, electrical and electronic systems in the bonobo home sustained significant damage, and good progress is being made to restore those systems. It may be a month before the human-occupied areas of the building are fully functioning.

Source: http://www.ewire.com/display.cfm/Wire_ID/4867

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Indonesia: Yogyakarta?s wildlife rescue center facing survival crisis

Tarko Sudiarno, The Jakarta Post, Yogyakarta

For several years, the Yogyakarta Wildlife Rescue Center (PPSJ) in Sendangsari village of Kulonprogo has been struggling to survive.

Workers have to put in extra hours while the center has to constantly seek more funds to avoid shutting down and leaving wild animals under its protection with nowhere to go.

The center is home to 400 animals and has 30 employees, meaning it has to come up with at least Rp 57 million (US$6,130) each month to supply food, animal treatments and employees’ salaries.

The center’s manager, Sugi Hartono, said the PPSJ had to become independent when the Gibbon Foundation stopped providing financial assistance in 2006 following the end of its cooperation with the Forestry Ministry, which administers the center.

The PPSJ was established in 2003 and takes up 14 hectares of land in the Menoreh mountain range in Kulon Progo regency, Yogyakarta.

The center is responsible for rehabilitating wild animals taken from their habitats by authorized government agencies and placed under the center’s care.

Since its founding back in 2003, the PPSJ has accommodated 54 different species. Of the 4,194 animals the center has looked after, 2,873 have been rehabilitated and released back to the wild. Among these animals are sea hawks, pig-snout tortoises, bondol hawks and orangutans.

Another 625 animals have been sent to zoos, wild animal parks and safari parks as part of their education and breeding programs.

Before being released to the wild, the confiscated animals need to be rehabilitated. It is not easy for wild animals like orangutans, bears, gibbons and birds to be returned to the forest after being kept as pets for so long.

Such rescue centers can only be found in Yogyakarta and Manado in North Sulawesi. The center in Yogyakarta has decided it cannot accept any additional animals because of limited funds.

Sugi said the center is like the last fortress of animal rescues, requiring dedication, idealism and a large amount of funding.

As far as the employees are concerned, loyalty and dedication is no problem. But the problem with funding has been quite difficult, Sugi said.

The delivery of the promised financial assistance from the Forestry Ministry does not arrive on time every month.

“It has been three months and we still haven’t received our salaries. This is not the first time. Fortunately, we can cover costs for the animal’s food from the earnings raised from a caf? and homestay.

“Without these earnings, we would have collapsed long ago, like similar centers in Bali, West Java and Malang (East Java),” Sugi said.

Since financial assistance from the Gibbon Foundation was cut, the center has had to think hard to find ways to raise money.

Four hectares of the PPSJ’s land is reserved for wildlife conservation and the remainder for a variety of outbound games.

The homestay facility was previously free of charge but now visitors have to pay.

The center has also decided to use its land for different programs, such as camping, outbound games, fish ponds and even cottages.

The center also hosts a student green program about replanting and introducing different wildlife species.

There, the students were taught how to feed animals, take care of them and release them back into their natural habitat.

However, Sugi said the center’s hard work to raise more money was not enough to ensure the center’s future and fresh commitment from the government was needed.

Source: http://old.thejakartapost.com/detailfeatures.asp?fileid=20080701.Q01&irec=0

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Alternative State: Hawaii has become an incubator for all sorts of renewable-energy projects

HONOLULU ? A state better known for sun and fun is quietly morphing into one of the world?s leading incubators of alternative energy.

Royal Dutch Shell PLC is heading up a test venture in Hawaii to turn oil-rich algae into fuel. If the process is found commercially viable, the Anglo-Dutch conglomerate could build algae-processing plants elsewhere.

Ever-Green Energy LLC of St. Paul, Minn., plans to build a plant in Honolulu that uses seawater to cool office buildings; if successful, the project will be expanded to other states. A start-up company, meanwhile, is deploying miniature solar-thermal collectors on Oahu to help generate more power for the local electricity grid. This set-up, too, if successful, will be reproduced elsewhere.

The reason for all the interest: location, location, location.

“Hawaii is the only place in the world where you have access to every form of renewable energy, and you are on the dollar and the U.S. legal system,” says Joelle Simonpietri, a former venture capitalist who now heads an algae-to-fuel firm called Kuehnle AgroSystems Inc.

Hawaii is trying to convert to clean energy as fast as it can. Petroleum imports make up about 80% of the energy supply for Hawaii?s main utility, leaving the state among those hardest hit by the run-up in oil prices. Electricity rates have gone through the roof. The average residential rate on Oahu, where most of Hawaii?s 1.2 million residents live, had doubled to 25.50 cents a kilowatt hour ? the highest in the U.S. ? from 12.74 cents in 1999, according to Hawaiian Electric Co., the state?s major utility.

So, in January, Gov. Linda Lingle announced plans under a state-federal partnership for Hawaii to derive 70% of its energy from renewable sources by 2030 ? one of the most ambitious targets in the world.

The state has gotten a head start toward this goal in some places. On Maui, for example, wind farms power 11,000 homes, or about 10% of that island?s energy, while on the Big Island, which is Hawaii itself, geothermal power from volcanic vents accounts for about a fifth of the energy there.

And on Oahu, Hawaiian Electric is building a new power plant that will generate 110 megawatts ? enough power for about 30,000 homes ? and will run completely on biodiesel fuel. The $160 million plant, expected to open next year, will initially get its fuel from imported palm oil.

“Everything is possible as oil prices rise,” says Henry Montgomery, chief executive of MontPac Outsourcing, a finance and accounting consultancy in Honolulu.

Not all the technologies are problem free. Environmentalists want to make sure, for example, that Hawaiian Electric doesn?t import any of its palm oil from endangered rainforests in Asia. Utility officials say that their palm oil will come from sustainable sources, and that over time the plant will rely more on crops grown in Hawaii.

There?s also a question of whether the sources of energy can overcome technical hurdles, among other challenges.

Gov. Lingle, for her part, says Hawaii is counting on a multitude of the clean-energy technologies to succeed ? not any particular one. “If our experience with petroleum has taught us anything, it is not to get reliant on any one source of energy,” the governor said in a recent interview at her state capital office, where, moments earlier, the power went down due to a temporary malfunction.

See a sampling of what?s going on in Hawaii:
http://www.thinkgreenhawaii.com/?p=91

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Slate: Should apes be treated like people?

Animal-Rights Farm:
Ape rights and the myth of animal equality

By William Saletan

Source: Slate
http://www.slate.com/id/2194568/

Should apes be treated like people?

Under a resolution headed for passage in the Spanish parliament, respecting the personal rights of “our non-human brothers” won’t just be a good idea. It’ll be the law.

The resolution, approved last week by a parliamentary committee with broad support, urges the government to implement the agenda of the Great Ape Project, an organization whose founding declaration says apes “may not be killed” or “arbitrarily deprived of their liberty.” No more routine confinement. According to Reuters, the proposal would commit the government to ending involuntary use of apes in circuses, TV ads, and dangerous experiments.
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Proponents hail the resolution as the first crack in the “species barrier.” Peter Singer, the philosopher who co-founded GAP, puts it this way: “There is no sound moral reason why possession of basic rights should be limited to members of a particular species.” If aliens or monkeys are shown to have moral or intellectual abilities similar to ours, we should treat them like people.

He’s right. To borrow Martin Luther King’s rule, you should be judged by what’s inside you, not by what’s on the surface.

If the idea of treating chimps like people freaks you out, join the club. Creationists have been fighting this battle for a long time. They realized long ago that evolution threatened humanity’s special status. Maybe you thought all this evolution stuff was just about the past. Surprise! Once you’ve admitted chimps are your relatives, you have to think about treating them that way. That’s why, when the Spanish proposal won approval last week, GAP’s leader in Spain called it a victory for “our evolutionary comrades.”

Opponents view the resolution as egalitarian extremism. Spain’s conservative party frets that it would grant animals the same rights as people. Spanish newspapers and citizens complain that ape rights are distracting lawmakers from human problems. Wesley Smith, my favorite anti-animal-rights blogger, sees the resolution as the first step in a campaign to “elevate all mammals to moral equality with humans.” Ultimately, Smith warns, “Animal rights activists believe a rat, is a pig, is a dog, is a boy.”

You can certainly find that theme in some quarters. GAP calls humans, chimps, bonobos, gorillas, and orangutans “members of the community of equals,” and Singer holds out the possibility that GAP “may pave the way for the extension of rights to all primates, or all mammals, or all animals.” But the arguments GAP has deployed in Spain don’t advance the idea of equality among animals. They destroy it.

GAP is scientifically honest. And science doesn’t show mental parity between great apes and human adults. What it shows, as the group’s president acknowledges, is that great apes “experience an emotional and intellectual conscience similar to that of human children.” Accordingly, the Spanish proposal doesn’t treat apes like you or me. It treats them like “humans of limited capacity, such as children or those who are mentally incompetent and are afforded guardians or caretakers to represent their interests.”

And that’s just the top rung of the inequality ladder. GAP’s mission statement says great apes are entitled to rights based on their “morally significant characteristics.” It says they

enjoy a rich emotional and cultural existence in which they experience emotions such as fear, anxiety and happiness. They share the intellectual capacity to create and use tools, learn and teach other languages. They remember their past and plan for their future. It is in recognition of these and other morally significant qualities that the Great Ape Project was founded.

Morally significant qualities. Morally significant characteristics. These are appeals to discrimination, not universal equality. Most animals don’t have a rich cultural life. They can’t make tools. They don’t teach languages. Singer even points out that “chimpanzees, bonobos and gorillas have long-term relationships, not only between mothers and children, but also between unrelated apes.” Special rights for animals in committed relationships! It sounds like a Moral Majority for vegans.

Opening your mind to science-based animal rights doesn’t eliminate inequality. It just makes the inequality more scientific. A rat can’t match a pig, much less a boy. In fact, as a GAP board member points out, “We are closer genetically to a chimp than a mouse is to a rat.”

George Orwell wrote the cruel finale to this tale 63 years ago in Animal Farm: “All animals are equal. But some animals are more equal than others.” That wasn’t how the egalitarian uprising in the book was supposed to turn out. It wasn’t how the animal rights movement was supposed to turn out, either.

Source: Slate
http://www.slate.com/id/2194568/

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Using human rights to combat palm oil?s hazards

By Irene Hadiprayitno , Utrecht

The palm oil industry is not only popular in the discourse of biofuels, but it is also economically lucrative.

In Indonesia alone the industry covers 17 provinces, employing about 2 million workers. The industry has generated an income amounting to Rp 7.779 million.

However, while examining the situation at the grassroots level, the effect is to the contrary, rather than improving it is victimizing.

Millions of hectares of tropical forests have been burned to make way for oil palm plantations; an annual haze is being experienced by people living in the vicinity. According to Sawit Watch, Indonesia has increased its palm estates to 7.3 million hectares and is planning to expand the area by a further 20 million hectares — an area the size of England, the Netherlands and Switzerland combined.

Moreover, the industry is also notoriously known as the cause of local conflicts. In January 2008, Sawit Watch monitored 513 conflicts between communities and companies. Some of these conflicts can be traced back to earlier land disputes. Mostly, they are over land rights, but other disputes arise over compensation, unmet promises and smallholding arrangements.

The industry has also caused displacement, homelessness and morbidity. In Aceh, 360,000 people were displaced from their homes and 70 died as a result of floods in 2006, which have been a common problem in the region since oil palm plantations arrived.

At the grassroots level, regardless of how important the palm oil is for biodiesel production, the rising price does not affect peasants’ income. Their salaries remain determined by the regional minimum wage scheme. In the case of North Barito, Central Kalimantan, one of the prominent palm oil plantations, it is only Rp. 876,536, an unreasonable amount compared to the selling price of crude palm oil, which was US$1135 per metric ton on Jan. 15, 2008.

Ideally, development should imply a structural improvement to people’s ability to sustain their daily livelihoods. Indeed, not only are economies to be uplifted, but the people themselves. Thus, both living standards and capabilities of those living at the grassroots should increase.

When designing a policy, a primary concern should be how to protect those affected by the consequences and, in particular, how to secure their entitlements within the execution of development policies. It is here we touch upon internationally accepted human rights standards and procedures. Human rights pertaining to each and every human being constitutes a necessity for protecting people against hazards.

When combating hazards caused by the palm oil industry, one can refer to the United Nations’ Declaration on the Right to Development adopted by the General Assembly in 1986. The declaration defines the right to development as an inalienable human right by virtue. Accordingly, every human and all peoples are entitled to participate in, contribute to and enjoy economic, social, cultural and political development so that all human rights and fundamental freedoms can be fully realized.

Obviously, development is seen here as a process that encompasses economic, social, cultural and political aspects. This implies a structural uplifting of welfare and well-being, affecting not just infrastructure, but also human beings.

The declaration regards those affected by development policies as right-holders who have to be protected against losing their entitlements, a common situation in development hazards. Accordingly, the right to development requires adopting favorable measures for development beneficiaries in the development process and for development victims to seek claims for compensation from development hazards.

The Indonesian government is responsible for implementing the right to development. However, rather than eradicating the hazard, they continues to comply with other interests rather than people. There are no appropriate measures allocated to deal with homelessness, degradation of health, morbidity or social conflict.

Instead the government recently adopted a forestry law, which provides a broad license for companies to exploit protected forests as long as they are willing to pay annual rental fees ranging between Rp 1.2 million (US$125) and Rp 3 million per hectare. Notably, the law prioritizes companies over people, who are now more vulnerable to development hazards.

In the case of the palm oil industry, the Indonesian government not only denies access to compensation, but also fails to protect and respect peoples’ entitlements by not taking actions to eradicate the hazards and adopting disincentive regulations.

Using human rights to combat hazards caused by the palm oil industry entails protecting people during the process and ensuring fairness in development distribution. From the peoples’ perspective, this grants opportunities for legitimate claims addressing correlated obligations or duties. Thus, it stresses the opportunity to seek remedies and compensation in the case of development hazards.

The writer is a PhD Candidate at the Netherlands Institute of Human Rights, Utrecht University, writing on the topic of the right to development.

Source: http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2008/05/27/using-human-rights-combat-palm-oil039s-hazards.html

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