Rhino research station to be built

Multa Fidrus, The Jakarta Post, Serang

As part of the effort to empower local people that live in and around Ujung Kulon National Park on the western tip of Java, the park management plans to build a rhinoceros research station.

"We hope the park can improve the park's image, which in turn, will improve the economy in the area," said the park's chief Puja Utama in a discussion held at the Tirtayasa University in Serang on Thursday.

It was poverty, according to Puja, which was main reason of at least nine foiled attempts by local people to damage the world heritage site since 2004.

"The latest cases involved people bombing (for fishing purposes) a coral reef along the 44,337 hectares of marine area and illegal hunting of wild animals," he said.

Puja said the park is in dire need of cooperation from any institution that shares the same intention of protecting the ecological conservation area and empowering the people living around it.

"We welcome any kind of protective attempts, which will prevent illegal hunting, deforestation and other damage to the 76,214 hectares of forest and the 44,337 hectares of marine areas from irresponsible people," he said.

Six hectares of the conservation area have been occupied by local people since 1992 and they have exploited some 4,000 hectares of the forest.

The park, where the endangered single-horn Java rhinoceros makes its habitat, occupies a total of some 120,000 hectares of land. An estimated 60 rhinos and 800 buffaloes, including 360 species of plants, can be found in the park.

The park receives an average of 5,000 visitors annually, of which, some 30 to 40 percent are tourists from overseas.

Another speaker during Thursday's seminar, Danoe Winoto of the Indonesian Wildlife Fund, said that all stakeholders, including the Ministry of Forestry and state timber company PT Perhutani should work hand-in-hand to help in the establishment of the rhinoceros research station.

"Moreover, the area around Mount Honje in the park, horticultural trees can be planted, which can be an alternative for locals to earn a living so they won't touch the conservation area anymore," he suggested.