Malaysians against ‘orangutan diplomacy’ to sell palm oil

Following the Chinese model with the panda, Kuala Lumpur wants to donate a monkey specimen to each country that will buy the controversial production. Indignant reactions and criticism on the net for a proposal described as ‘gross stupidity’. This risks destroying the natural ecosystem and endangering other species, including the Sumatran tiger. 

Kuala Lumpur (AsiaNews) - As part of a unique promotional campaign, the Malaysian government is launching ‘orangutan diplomacy’. According to a proposal formulated by Minister of Plantations and Commodities Abdul Ghani, Kuala Lumpur intends to ‘honour’ with a monkey specimen every nation in the world that buys domestically produced palm oil.

Underlying the project is the belief that it will strengthen international relations, particularly with major importing nations including the European Union, India and China.

Malaysia is now the world's second largest producer of palm oil after Indonesia. However, the idea put forward by the government to support trade in a controversial product has drawn the ire of much of the population, who brand this sales strategy as ‘pure idiocy’.

One net user, commenting on an article published by Malaysiakini, the country's leading online news portal, pointed out that this ‘copycat policy’ will never succeed internationally. The reference is to the policy promoted since the 1970s by China, which offered a panda as a gift to improve relations with other countries.

He also added that ‘these kinds of novelty gifts are no longer an attraction, because people are paying more attention to the welfare of the great apes that live in the Borneo states of Sabah and Sarawak, and which are on the verge of extinction’.

Another on social described the proposal as ‘gross stupidity’. He went on to ask: ‘Is it right to destroy the habitat, family units and kingdom structure of orangutans by turning rainforests into oil palm plantations, just so these primates can find a home in foreign zoos?’

The same network user finally pointed out that orangutans are primates that need intact forests to survive and procreate, not to be locked up in iron cages in zoos to be admired by people.

Interviewed by AsiaNews, a Sarawak teacher, Marlyn Madrod, who hails from the land of the orangutans, asks this question: ‘Will foreign nations buy more palm oil to receive an orangutan as a gift? In reality, doing so will only encourage more destruction of the animal's natural habitat’.

‘The minister's suggestion,’ the lecturer commented, ‘must be the biggest joke of the century. According to Madrod, this proposal is an attempt to bribe foreign nations in order to incentivise them to buy Malaysian palm oil, which faces stiff global competition from soya bean producers. ‘No nation,’ he concludes, ‘will be fooled by this destructive idea that endangers the orangutan population and drives it to extinction.

The International Union for Conservation of Nature's ‘red list’ estimates that Borneo's orangutan population - shared by Brunei, Indonesia and Malaysia - will shrink to around 47,000 by 2025. The causes of the collapse include anthropogenic pressure and habitat loss due to the development of palm oil plantations. The agency estimates that only 13,500 orangutans are left in Sumatra.

According to the international NGO Sumatran Orangutan Society (SOS), the key to saving the orangutans is to preserve their forests. Without them they cannot survive, and without them the forests themselves would also lose a crucial ‘gardener’, precisely because he helps maintain the health and resilience of the ecosystem.

‘It is also,’ the NGO continues, ‘a crucial habitat for many unique and threatened animals, such as the Sumatran tiger, rhinoceros and elephant, as well as countless types of birds, insects and other creatures. Therefore, by protecting orangutans we also protect thousands of other species, the entire biodiversity of the tropical rainforest’.

Protecting the orangutan habitat is a ‘natural climate solution’ that will help reduce emissions and adapt to climate impacts as part of global climate goals. Another international orangutan advocacy group, based in the UK, says that due to deforestation, the orangutan population is being gradually decimated.

According to the Orangutan Appeal UK, oil palm plantations are just one example of how the great apes have suffered the loss of their natural ecosystem. 

• Malaysia
• environment
• government
• orangutan diplomacy
• nature
• crops
• palm oil
• habitat