Restoring the
rainforest with
local communities
Focus on: rainforest
Traditionally, indigenous people in this area
gathered rainforest products such as rattan,
resins and honey for their own use and for
trade. They fished in the many rivers and some
people farmed areas of land. They farmed
by burning small patches of forest, cultivating
the soil, growing food and then moving to
another patch. This way of life did not impact
the forest in the long-term because the
vegetation was allowed to re-grow.
What can we do to help?
If we don’t act now, this rainforest
and its amazing wildlife will be
gone in five years.
But there is hope. Harapan Rainforest can be saved. The RSPB, Burung
Indonesia and BirdLife International have stopped deforestation there to let
the forest recover. A lot of trees have been cut down, but there are still
good areas of forest left.
Thanks to efforts by Burung Indonesia and the RSPB, the law has been
changed to allow forests to be designated for restoration rather than
logging. This is really great news, because these forests can now be
looked after and managed to help wildlife. Harapan Rainforest is the first
Indonesian forest to be managed in a way that restores the ecosystem.
Many tall trees have
disappeared in
Harapan Rainforest
Bursting with wildlife
This project will stop up to five million tonnes of carbon dioxide per year
entering the atmosphere, which is equivalent to Manchester’s emissions.
There will be no more fires releasing the gas, and new trees will absorb it.
We are asking people to raise money to buy and plant trees in Harapan
Rainforest. Find out how you can get involved at www.rspb.org.uk/youth
Tropical rainforests are rich in wildlife. They are home to almost
three-quarters of the world’s known land-based plants and animals.
We hope our project to save Harapan Rainforest will enable local families to continue their traditional lifestyle if they wish.
Owen Franken (Corbis)
Language
Selamat pagi (slam-at pa-gee)
The language
in Sumatra is
Indonesian.
Indonesians
have different
ways to say “hello”
depending on
where the sun
is in the sky.
Selamat siang (slam-at see ang)
Good morning (only when the sun is up, around 11 am)
When the sun is overhead 11 am–3 pm
Selamat sore (slam-at saw-ray)
The Harapan Rainforest in Sumatra is part of a
lowland forest – the richest in plant life in the
world and home to a stunning array of insects,
birds and other animals. Because it’s so rich in
wildlife, Harapan Rainforest is a “biodiversity
hotspot”.
Sumatra is one of 17,508 islands that form the
world’s largest chain of islands: Indonesia.
Sumatra is twice the size of Britain, and the
sixth largest island in the world.
As the sun moves back towards the horizon, 3 pm–sunset
Selamat malam (slam-at mal-am)
Good evening (only when it is dark)
Terima kasih (terr-y-mah kah-see)
Thank you
The Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (RSPB) is a registered charity: England and Wales no. 207076, Scotland no. SC037654 465-1132-08-09
RSPB Wildlife Explorers
is the junior membership
of the Royal Society for
the Protection of Birds
SAVING HARAPAN
RAINFOREST
In the past few decades, Sumatra’s lowland forests have been
chopped down for farming, wood and land. There were 16 million
hectares (160,000 square kilometres) of rainforest in 1900; today there
are just 500,000 hectares (5,000 square kilometres) left. This is a
disaster, not only for the wildlife that lives there, but because the Earth
needs huge areas of forest to help keep climate change under control.
Rainforests act as “green lungs” – absorbing carbon dioxide and
producing oxygen.
The RSPB and partners have been given the lease to the Harapan
Rainforest for 100 years. We are raising money to restore the
forest and plant more trees for the wildlife that lives there.
Clare Kendall
Harapan Rainforest is close to the equator, so it is wet and hot. These
conditions are ideal for plants and trees to grow again in the rainforest.
Working with local people, cuttings and seeds of native trees will be
collected from Harapan Rainforest. Villagers will grow these in nurseries
until the saplings are ready to be planted in the most degraded areas
of the rainforest. These new trees will grow fast to replace the tallest,
oldest trees that have been chopped down.
Clare Kendall
Ian Rowland
About eight indigenous
family groups live in Harapan
Rainforest. They belong to
an ethnic group called the
Batin Sembilan.
Fantastic forest:
MANY SPECIES ARE AT RISK
rotting meat, dragon’s
blood and giant butterflies
THE
RAINFOREST
a bird’s-eye
view
The world’s largest flower,
the rafflesia, grows in
Harapan Rainforest. It
blooms for only one week,
developing five reddishbrown petals splashed with
white. It has no leaves, can
measure one metre across
and can weigh nine
kilograms. To pollinate,
it attracts flies by looking
like rotting meat – and
smelling of it too.
Rattans are thorny, climbing palms with backward-curving
spines. The spines are attached to long, thin tendrils, which
the plants use to climb up other trees in the rainforest. People
in Indonesia make a living from harvesting wild rattans and
processing the stems to make furniture, rope or baskets.
In Harapan Rainforest, one type of rattan palm has a fruit
with a red resin known as dragon's blood. The resin is valued
for its antiseptic properties and is used in Chinese medicine.
In 2006, you could sell a kilogram of dragon’s blood for
£100, so it is a lucrative and sustainable source of income
for local villagers.
Steven David Miller (naturepl.com)
This map shows the location of the
Harapan Rainforest on the island of
Sumatra, Indonesia, close to the Equator.
Logged forest areas can be dry
and are very susceptible to burning.
Deliberate burning to clear land is
illegal in Indonesia, but forest fires
are still widespread. If the forest is
on peat soils, fire may take hold
and the ground could smoulder
for months, filling the air for
hundreds of miles with polluting
smoke. Fires burned out of control
across Indonesia in 1997, covering
all of south east Asia in a deadly
haze. With no trees, water is not
absorbed into the ground easily
Once forests are cleared, the
Government reclassifies the forest
so that it can be used for a different
purpose. Companies establish
palm, pulp or timber plantations,
which can be very lucrative. Palm
oil is a versatile and edible oil, used
widely around the world in
household products such as
cooking oil, margarines and
spreads, soap, crisps and ice
cream. It is also being increasingly
used as biodiesel. Indonesia is
now the world’s biggest producer
of palm oil. Unfortunately, industrial
palm and tree plantations are
unsuitable for most wildlife, so
only the most common and
robust species can survive there.
Rainforests also produce other
useful resources. The wood from
rainforests appears everywhere,
from outdoor furniture and paper
to plywood boards. The land can
be used for mining, and oil and
gas are often found there.
Find out more about saving rainforest animals at: www.rspb.org.uk/youth
Clare Kendall
Find out more about saving rainforest animals at: www.rspb.org.uk/youth
Another company clears the
remaining trees from the site,
but illegal loggers could also move
in at any point, especially if there
are no other activities taking place.
All the trees are removed.
so there are more flash floods.
Clare Kendall
Is it a bird? Is it
a butterfly?
Why destroy the rainforests?
The reasons are complex, but here’s
an example of a typical situation:
the Government assigns a forest
area to a commercial logging
company that cuts down the
most valuable trees for timber
and plywood.
Birdwing
butterflies
These are the largest butterflies
in the world. The wingspan of their
black and electric-green-coloured
wings can be up to 17 centimetres.
These butterflies are found in the
rainforests of Sumatra, Borneo
and Malaysia. They get their name
from the shape of their forewings,
which are larger and more slender
than the hind wings. Birdwing
butterflies live on the sandy banks
of rivers and hot springs in the
rainforest. They are threatened
by habitat loss and capture for
the wildlife trade. Harapan
Rainforest is one place where
these butterflies still breed in
the wild.
The Great Argus
pheasant and the
Storm’s stork –
just two of the
species that
need our help.
Pheasant by Jacob Wijpkema (rspb-images.com), stork by Clare Kendall
Rattans
Check out our Harapan
Rainforest poster for
details and images of
four other threatened
species: Sumatran tiger,
rhinoceros hornbill,
sun bear and
agile gibbon.
There are at least 58 mammals in the forest,
many of which are at risk of extinction, including
the clouded leopard, fishing cat, giant squirrel,
Asian elephant, Malayan tapir, Malayan
porcupine and Sumatran otter.
Cleared areas are at risk of fire
Rafflesia
Researchers have found
at least 43 amphibian
and reptile species in
Harapan Rainforest,
including the endangered
spiny turtle and the
threatened Asiatic soft
shell turtle.
Corbis
Gerald Cubitt (naturepl.com)
Rafflesia: striking
but stinky!
Marco Lambertini (BirdLife)
The Harapan Rainforest covers an area two-thirds the size of Greater
London. Hundreds of weird and wonderful plants and creatures rely
on it for food, shelter and a place to breed or hunt.
There are at least 287 bird species in Harapan
Rainforest – that’s more than we have breeding
in the whole of the UK! These include the
Storm’s stork – of which there are fewer than
500 left in the world – and the Great Argus
pheasant. These pheasants are named after
the Greek god Argus who had one hundred
eyes, because the male birds have hundreds
of beautiful iridescent eye shapes on their tail
feathers. During courtship, the male clears
a patch of mud to make a dance floor where
he shakes his tail feathers to attract a mate.