Protecting peatland in Borneo

Although peatland covers just 3% of the earth’s surface, in Indonesia, the wetland habitat is under severe threat from expansion of the palm oil industry.

A decade ago in southern Borneo, a large area of peatland was about to be burned and cleared for plantations, threatening one of the last remaining wild populations of orangutans at nearby Tanjung Puting National Park.

The Rimba Raya project was set up to protect the reserve, and prove to locals and officials that conservation was more economically worthwhile than palm oil – despite the high demand for the latter to make biofuels.

Successful initiatives at Rimba Raya include:

• Training volunteer firefighters to prevent forest and peat fires

• Building libraries to improve literacy

• Egg farming cooperatives to provide alternative income to plantation work

• Collecting recyclable rubbish to clean up local rivers