Masarang HK Society Limited 青山綠水協會有限公司

Orangutans: gardeners of the forest and sentient beings. I could produce a huge list of epithets referring to all of their special abilities but for me those two designations are all we need to realize that we have to step up and
take action to save orangutans and their habitat.

The forests of Borneo and Sumatra are treasure houses of biodiversity. Percentages or comparisons to other countries make no sense. Biodiversity is what shaped the world we live in today and is what we will need for our future to find solutions for our needs. This can be through finding new food plants, new medicines, development of technology through biomimicry, etc. Orangutans are not just part of that biodiversity, they can even teach us about plants and medicines and are responsible for the distribution and enhanced germination of many different plant seeds from the rainforest. Their home is the lowland rainforest with the highest biodiversity of all, which is also the most converted ecosystem for human use. Guarding their existence actually means guarding our own future. Long term interests should prevail over short-term unsustainable profit.

I have spoken about orangutans as my friends on many occasions and about their special capabilities to even understand us, complicated humans. I have written (e.g. on orangutan day 2019) about their empathy and capability to form loving relationships, sometimes covering many decades like the first orangutan I released, Uce, here on the right with her baby boy Bintang. The photographer gave her several polaroid pictures of this meeting in the forest where she had been living for many years. She kept coming back regularly to see them from our staff in the forest for more than a year to look at, hold them for a while to then return to the tree canopy.

It is with great sadness that after more than three decades of trying to help them they still need our help so much. The global pandemic caused by Covid-19 is not making things easier and with climate change related natural disasters I appreciate that we are being asked for help by so many organizations. I realize that it is a very hard time for all of us, but if you can then please think of our red haired cousins in need too this August 19th and help in some way if you possibly can.

Willie Smits, August 19, 2021
Founder of the Borneo Orangutan Survival Foundation
Founder of the Sintang Orangutan Center Foundation

This was my morning view not long after waking up in the BOS ecolodge of Samboja Lestari. The chorus of so many bird songs mixed with cicadas carried the overtones. Then the long calls of several big male orangutans welled up from the mist beneath, under which their islands lay waiting for the sun to lift the damp and warm their bodies for a new day. And if you listen carefully you can hear the sound of streaming water somewhere down there in this lush valley in between thousands of trees. It is hard to believe that some 15 years ago this valley was devoid of trees and wildlife. There was only silent yellow grass, all that was left after a series of human interventions in the original forest, followed by many recurrent fires that removed nutrients and biodiversity resulting in those vast soundless biological deserts.

So Samboja Lestari proves it can be done. We can help nature to recover her rightful place. And many of the orangutans that passed through this green oasis after rescues and rehabilitation now live in original rain forest again and have gotten babies that will never know the suffering of their parents. Since that crucial day in October 1989 when I first looked into the eyes of an orangutan baby on the market in Balikpapan much has happened and much was achieved. In 1991, with for the first three years only the help of primary school children in Balikpapan I started BOS, now the world’s largest great ape rescue organization.

Sitting on the top level terrace of the ecolodge, sipping my coffee, just like the morning mist I let my thoughts drift back to events that took place these last three decades. How nature knows best and how it can reclaim the earth when we are willing learn from her and apply her lessons. But also thinking about the answer to those deep long calls rising from the valley beneath…

The cheekpadders are calling there, the male giants with hormones streaming through their veins that not just physically change them in appearance, they want freedom. I imagine what is going on in their minds, how each of them has his own personality. But many of them for sure are unhappy as most of us would be when confined in small spaces. And when approached by people they often throw these temper tantrums and demonstrate their huge power by throwing barrels or whatever can move or rattle in their cages. And they can be very dangerous. It takes very special people to sit down with them and build up this friendship that can comfort them. Two dear friends of me, Odom Kisar and Leo Hulsker are such people.

This morning I sat down with a big cheekpadded orangutan that was brought here by the Ministry of Forestry a few days ago after he wandered into the remote village of Lusan. Physically he looks in prime condition and we do not know why he left the jungle, unless the jungle left… He must be one of the hundreds of orangutans I released in the Meratus foothill forest more than 20 years ago. In a straight line he was 86 kilometers from that point and looking at forest corridors he must have travelled more than 100 kilometers to show up here. He has a chip but we have not yet found out who he is. His fingerprints will be sent to my retired Dutch policeman friend Jan Geerdink who set up the cooperation with the Dutch police to enter the fingerprints of our rescued orangutans in their advanced system.

After a few minutes this beautiful male sat down on the other side of the bars and asked me to scratch his head and stroke his lips and cheekpads. He must still remember me from all these years ago and I so much look forward finding out who he is and remember his story. I know they remember, and probably much better than we do. So on the one hand this warm feeling of meeting a dear old friend gave me this euphoric sense of happiness that goes from your throat to your belly but on the other hand my thoughts soon went to the worrying question why he was here behind bars again…

When I first started the Samboja Lestari project it was with the intent to show that even from the worst possible situation we can still repair things and always should keep hope. But I realize how easy it is in this age of superfast connections to be overwhelmed with this avalanche of seemingly never ending bad news and to sometimes feel hopeless. The trees and the processes of nature are back here, but another goal of this project was to provide a safe place for the so-called non-releasable orangutans. But this good intent has not come to realization. And I am no longer confident that Samboja Lestari can be that place. I designed this haven to create “Life in Harmony”. But greed is always ready to pounce. Hence the title of this blog. Let me explain…

Years ago a coal mining boom started. And no longer could we expand our Samboja Lestari area because the money offered by wealthy local investors to local villagers to take out the high quality coal that is also underneath Samboja Lestari resulted in the formation of a blackened devasted landscape around us. Then some bad persons tried to set up groups of local people to claim lots of the Samboja Lestari land to mine as well. This resulted in the loss of a significant number of our planted trees. Then the new toll road from Balikpapan to Samarinda was constructed passing by the border of our land and making it as property much more valuable. So more opportunistic people tried to grab a share and illegally claimed parts of our land. Again they burn fields to grow short lived agricultural crops and the cycle of soil degradation started again. Now the area is even included in the area of the future capital of Indonesia worsening the pressure even more. I hope that with help and support for legal assistance BOS can reclaim all that rightfully belongs to the orangutans and sun bears at Samboja Lestari.

With our BOS Samboja Lestari staff witnessing one of the areas with encroachment.

Under the present conditions I fear it will no longer be possible to create a sufficient large enclosed area that can be safe to serve as a sanctuary. So where to go with our “non-releasable orangutans”, like those with chronic TBC, cut of arms, blind and those giants that are calling in the valley beneath? Well I never give up and we are already working on a permanent safe forest home for them. But I will tell more about that another time. The struggle goes on. There is so much to do but for now I just want to let  this sunrise and the sounds of the reborn jungle recharge me for what is to come.

Willie Smits,
June 12th, 2021
Samboja Lestari Ecolodge
East Kalimantan, Indonesia

Today, June 8 we continue the idea, originally put forward by the Canadian Government at the 1992 Earth Summit in Rio, to pay special attention to the world’s oceans. Each year a special theme is chosen which in the past often included for instance the plastic problem. Today’s theme is Life & Livelihoods. Looking at the sad facts that we have already lost 90% of the big fish populations in the oceans and 50% of the world’s coral reefs we can immediately see how relevant the special 2021 theme is.
I am sure most of our Masarang Foundation friends know us best for our land rehabilitation work like reforestation, agroforestry, wildlife conservation, etc. But do not forget the hundreds of thousands of sea turtles hatchlings that went back to the ocean thanks to our work in Tulap and now also in our new Temboan and Salimburung projects. And though still very small scale we are working on helping the coral reefs recover which in itself will help the fish populations recover and that in turn will help the local people with more sustainable jobs and food security.
And let’s not forget that Masarang for years has organized beach clean ups with groups of school children, volunteers and local people and worked on recycling of plastic. We even invested in waste processing equipment for the people of Tomohon and made a masterplan to prevent plastic going to the oceans. Now we are starting a program on integrating ocean plastic waste from our almost 5 kilometers of coral beaches into our work on using local building materials that for instance can isolate walls better and thus safe energy while keeping our beaches cleaner.

On the left the villagers of nearby Mangkit cleaning up the Salimburung beach. On the right an international school from Hong Kong ready to to clean up the Tasikoki Beach

Besides all the past and ongoing work related to the oceans, I feel especially excited about our newest Temboan project. Here we show how the land condition and the coastal waters are intricately connected. By excluding artificial fertilizers and pesticides in our degraded land restoration and improving productivity through agroforestry we not only create sustainable jobs, healthy food production and sequestration of carbon dioxide but also prevent the ever expanding death zones in the oceans and maintain the huge underwater biodiversity in the coral reefs.

Through our work on land in Temboan Masarang is also supporting all the ecosystems above from mangroves and nipah palm forests to coral reefs and sea grass beds. All of them important to protect our coasts and contributing to reducing impacts of climarte change!

71% of the world is covered by oceans and they provide food, generate oxygen, regulate our climate and so much more but almost all that really matters starts from the small coastal zones where coral reefs, mangroves and seagrass are found and where we as Masarang Foundation do our part to ensure a better future that benefits people and our planet. There are so many special days but what really matters is how things are connected. And that is what Masarang is about, integration. If you pull on any single string in nature you will always find that everything else is connected to that. As I often say, nature knows best and we need to learn from nature if we want to safeguard this beautiful planet for all those that will follow us.

Willie Smits
June 8th, 2021
North Sulawesi, Indonesia