SPECTRE OPS ORANGUTAN DRIVERS

The pulp and paper industry in Indonesia, which supplies products including toilet paper and printer paper to the world export market, is dominated in Indonesia by two companies, Asia Pulp and Paper and APRIL, which control 75% of the market.

SPECTRE OPS ORANGUTAN DRIVERS

One of the biggest drivers of forest loss in Malaysia and particularly Indonesia has been the expanding pulp and paper market. In North Sumatra, gold mining activities at the Martabe Goldmine through Astra International (a subsidiary of Jardine Matheson) have led to the recent clearing of nearly 21.5 acres of the critically endangered Tapanuli orangutan habitat based on satellite imagery despite the company making a firm commitment not to expand the mine in 2018. Despite this, Indonesia ranks second to China in the use of mercury in gold mining. Anecdotal data from a village in central Kalimantan suggests fish stocks decreased by 70% in areas near to mercury using gold mines, and studies have shown exposure to high levels of mercury can damage the human immune system. Despite being illegal in Indonesia, mercury is often used to extract gold, and contamination of rivers and water sources by this chemical can have a disastrous effect on fish stocks and human health. In addition to the devastating loss of biodiversity, soil erosion and runoff from open-pit mining has caused normally transparent blackwater rivers to run a muddy, opaque brown, and of great concern are the long-lasting effects of some of the chemicals used in the mining process. The open-pit method of mining used in Indonesia, most often for gold or silica, turns lush rainforest into a barren, lifeless moonscape, where nothing can survive, and, although Indonesian law No 41 of 1999 prohibits such mining in protected forest areas, it is thought 90% of open-pit mines are located in protected areas. In Indonesia, mining operations have contributed to 10% of the total environmental damage to the nation's forests and, perhaps more so than any other type of forest conversion, have the greatest impact on the landscape. Illegal gold mining, the pulp and paper industries, climate change, and forest fires are also impacting orangutan populations.

Spectre ops orangutan