We All Need the Forest!

A group of youngsters stood by the road in the campus of Mulawarman University, wearing orangutan masks. They yelled, "Forest! Forest! Forest!", which attracted the attention of the passers-by. They were ProFauna's activists, also student members of Flora Fauna Lovers (Mahasiswa Penyayang Flora Fauna/Mapflofa), who had a campaign for the conservation of forests in Borneo.

Zulkifli, one of the students on the campaign, said "We as the young generation are very concerned about the forest destruction in Borneo, which also threaten the lives of the wildlife, especially the orangutan. We hope that all the related bodies could collaborate to protect the forest."

 "Orangutan-related problems in Borneo are very complicated, particularly because many of them live outside forested lands such as plantations and neighborhoods. That makes it difficult to avoid conflict with human," explained Rustam Fahmi, ProFauna's activist from Samarinda. Rustam, who is also a professor and researcher of wildlife added, "We really hope that  the government would be more careful in issuing mining and palm oil plantation permits, for it is very likely that the cleared lands are the habitats of the orangutan."

ProFauna's campaign in Samarinda is only the beginning of the Ride for Borneo 2014, which will continue until the end of May 2014. Six activists of ProFauna will go on a campaign tour to speak for the last forest for the Bornean orangutan.