WWF calls for action to save Sumatran tiger

JAKARTA (JP): The World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) called yesterday for immediate action to save the rare Sumatran tiger from extinction.

Ron Lilley, WWF coordinator on species in Indonesia, said the Sumatran tiger would go the down the extinction path in less than 50 years unless something is done to conserve them.

The Sumatran tiger is the only remaining tiger species in Indonesia, said Lilley, the Bali tiger disappeared in the 1940s and the Java tiger vanished in the 1980s.

There are only 500 remaining Sumatran tigers, and their numbers are declining because their habitat is shrinking and because of illegal poaching and hunting, he said.

Indonesia needs to conserve the few remaining tigers, he said.

"If it's not conserved, let's say it will disappear within 50 years, maybe faster," he said at a presentation about the fate of the Sumatran tiger.

The presentation was held after the signing of an agreement between WWF and the Eastman KODAK company. Under the agreement, the latter will raise Rp 50 million ($212,000) through the sales of its products for the WWF's tiger conservation efforts.

Present at the event were WWF chairman Agus Purnomo and KODAK's representative Karna B. Lesmana.

Lilley said the population growth forced conversion of the tigers' habitat from forest into human settlement areas in Sumatra has made the task of saving the tigers that much more difficult.

But illegal hunting is also a serious problem, trade in tiger flesh and its parts is a lucrative business, he said.

"Conservation is always low in the scale of priorities until something happens, just like the recent flood in Jakarta, then, suddenly people started to take action," Lilley said.

The government has designated two national parks for tiger conservation: the Mt. Leuser in Aceh, and the Kerinci Seblat, which covers Bengkulu, Jambi, South Sumatra and West Sumatra.

Tiger hunting appears to go on unchecked in spite of a 1990 Conservation Law banning the hunting of wild species including fully protected animals.

TRAFFIC (Trade Record Analysis of Flora and Fauna in Commerce) in its 1993 report estimated that 14 Sumatran tigers were lost every year to poaching and pest management.

The Convention on the International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Flora and Fauna in its 1994 report rated Indonesia as one of the most prominent exporters of tiger parts.

It said that between 1973 and 1992, Indonesia exported 4,094 kilos of tiger bones, most to South Korea.

Lilley said tiger parts were sought after because of the old Chinese belief that they have healing powers.

Tiger flesh is said to be good for nausea and malaria, and for reinvigorating the stomach and spleen, while tiger blood is reputed to strengthen the constitution and willpower, he said.

Tiger fat, skin, testes, hair, brain, eyeballs, nose, teeth, whiskers, gallstones, stomach, bile and tail, are also believed to have curing effects.

Lilley said there has been no scientific evidence to support the claims. "But, it's not the reality, it's what the people believe," he said. (ste)