Palm Oil Frenzy Threatens to Wipe out Orangutans

Matthew Supple
Soc Blog
February 19th

In a tragic turn of events the quest for reducing pollution people have turned to the pathetic excuse for an alternative research-palm oil. And in order to tap into this new cash crop, Indonesian trees are being leveled to make room for palm oil plantations. The trees in question are the habitat of the last remaining 50-60,000 orangutans and at a rate of 300 football fields an hour, this is a very real threat to the orangutans. Not only is the habitat of the ape being destroyed but the workers of the plantations routinely butcher them when they wander onto plantations. There are national parks in these areas and while the bigger palm oil companies are promising to avoid these parks, smaller companies are encroaching into protected land. The death toll is so severe that scientists predict the orangutans outside the preserves will have less than a decade left. This is because they're losing land, food and have gained a fierce predator--man.

I really hope that people notice not only how important it is to stop deforestation on its many fronts, but that gimmicky alternative fuel sources are doing more harm than good. First corn took the nation by storm now this. These apes are one of our closest relatives and it would be an immeasurable shame to lose them. It's quite sad we live in a world where such blatant destruction can take place and we do nothing of real significance to stop it. It may be because it's a less developed part of the world it's occurring in but that's hardly an excuse considering it's serving the developed worlds needs.

http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/JustOneThing/WireStory?id=6675131&page=1