Orangutans are also still regularly killed or captured. This occurs for three main reasons: first, even today some people still hunt orangutans for food, most notably in the non-Muslim parts of North Sumatra. Second, when orangutans enter farms or plantations at the for-est edge, for example to feed on fruit trees or other crops, they are often shot or otherwise killed, and any surviving infant eventually ends up in trade or as someone’s illegal pet (Hockings and Humle 2009). Third, at times infants may be captured to order for the pet trade, meaning that hunters will deliberately seek out adult females and kill them solely to obtain their infants, regard-less of whether they are in the forest or raiding crops (Nijman 2009; Campbell-Smith et al. 2010).

Year: 2011

From collection: Orangutans and the Economics of Sustainable Forest Management in Sumatra

Cartographer: Riccardo Pravettoni, UNEP/GRID-Arendal