Erik Meijaard, writing for The Jakarta Globe:
Globally, Malaysia is No. 2 and Indonesia No. 3 on the list of threatened species maintained by the International Union for Conservation of Nature. Indonesia and Malaysia outrank Brazil and Mexico, which are actually more species-rich.
One could argue that these two countries are simply not interested in conservation and that development at all costs comes first. But then why did they sign up to international conventions? Why do they have conservation and environmental laws that ought to protect species and their habitats? If these countries do not want conservation, just be honest and do away with these paper commitments.
As an Indonesian it’s almost a yearly event for the people and tv pundits to talk about nature being “angry” at us for neglecting them, and that is of course, because we’re inconvenienced every time there’s mass flooding or a huge landslide. I rarely hear people took the threatened animals point of view regarding nature, mainly because there’s supposedly more “important” issue at play, such as presidential election or political bullshit.
I wonder when and if sh*t really hit the fan, who’s going to get all the blame.