I came upon this article today at CNN:

http://www.cnn.com/2005/TECH/science/12/06/indonesia.new.species.reut/index.html

The primary thrust was about a new species of predator in Borneo, but the most interesting portion to me was the plan to clear 1.8 million hectacres of tropical jungle to create the world's largest palm oil plantation. What impact will this have on the native flora and fauna?

Interesting read! Thanks for sharing!
Don't know how it is done elsewhere but here in India the "Environmental Impact Assessment" that being carried out is a total chaos! From what I understand, it should be an inter/multi disciplinary approach kinda thing - haven't seen any real attempts to illustrate it's importance so far!.....
IMHO the impact on the local flora and fauna will be disastrous!

Mang

To put this into context, this is an area of 4.45 million acres or a little less than half the size of the Netherlands. Also, this is just one project in Borneo, and there are plenty more on the way. This will not only destroy a huge habitat area, but will open up the island for more orchid finds. If they are slipper orchids they will be "protected" by Cities and probably forever lost.

I can't think of any cases where replacing jungle with monoculture has done anything positive for biodiversity.

There will probably be considerable stress on the areas outside of the immediate deforestation too.

Well, I guess you can't have too much Palm Oil... :roll:

I don't see things like this ever stopping, and I think that's why I've always been so supportive of ex-situ conservation. If I have a choice of doing very little, or nothing, I choose very little. There are plenty of orchids that are extinct in the wild that I can grow and buy instead of just see pics or drawings of...and I'm very thankful for that. What irks me is when a large area is destroyed for purposes like the above, and the plants cannot be collected and sent to overseas caretakers due to things like CITES. I realize it would be a small drop in the bucket to just collect the orchids and other "trophy" species, compared to the ripple effect all the wildlife would be hit by...but I still feel it would be better than turning them into charcoal.

Jon

I'm with Jon on this one.
Very frustrating! Very exciting reading about a new species! :roll: for about one minute - then all the idiocy and commercialism enters the picture and the air is let out of the balloon.

I'd rather see the plants saved from certain destruction.

I suppose the flip side is that the palm oil plantation will provide jobs and livelihoods for the local population... With an area that size, the revenues should easily be in the millions of dollars (not sure since I never studied forestry...) and support many families.

Hopefully, some orchid nurseries will be able to move in ahead of the deforestation crews to help rescue some plants.

I suppose the flip side is that the palm oil plantation will provide jobs and livelihoods for the local population

Cynical me suspects the number of people making any "real" money off these plantations will be small. And for how long? Anybody know the lifecycle of a palm oil plantation? I have no idea, myself. Is this something that's going to be in production for decades to come? If not we should start looking for the grant money now to study the post-plantation succession of the site. :?

And I wish they'd stop referring to undescribed animals as "cat-fox" or "ferret-badger." It just confuses the laity. :roll:

Ya
I'm not sure if the plantations will improve the standard of living for locals or not. There may be a parrallel for the coffee industry.

Now that the world bank is subsidizing the Vietnamese coffee plantations vast tracks of jungle are converted to coffee plantations in Vietnam (more orchid loss), at a cost beyond what they are making on coffee. So now the non subsidized and established coffee growers in Columbia are going broke, and livng in poverty.