Land cover change in Tripa, Indonesia

Description

In the Tripa peat swamps, companies are operating seven large concessions of between 3,000 and 13,000 hectares. They are converting the remaining forests on peatlands into oil palm plantations. The concessions cover more than 75 percent of Tripa’s total area of 62,000 hectares. While almost certainly hosting as many as 1,000 orangutans or more in the early 1990s, when still covered in pristine peat swamp forest, there are thought to be less than 280 (Wich et al. 2008) still surviving in the remaining 17,000 hectares of forest.