Tramplers Annex 28,000 Hectares Of Forest In Tesso Nilo Park

Pekanbaru, Riau, Forest tramplers have annexed and converted 28,000 hectares of forests in the Tesso Nilo National Park in Riau and this threatens the sustainability of the conservation area, a local official has said.

"The trampled area covers 28 thousand hectares," head of Tesso Nilo National Park`s office Hayani Suprahman said here Friday.

According to her, forest trampling is still a serious threat to the conservation area.

It is feared that the threat would damage the nature of the Tesso Nilo National Park which has a collection of 360 floral types belonging to 165 genera and 57 tribes, Hayani said.

In addition, there are also 107 species of birds, 23 species of mammals, three types of primates, 50 species of fish, 15 species of reptiles and 18 species of amphibians, she added.

She said up to now at least 1500 families still occupy the Tesso Nilo area especially in the Pelalawan district.

In general, they deal with palm oil plantations. The Tesso Nilo National Park management still face difficulty to evict the forest tramplers despite continuous persuasive approaches, she said. "Most tramplers are paid by big investors," Hayani said.

She pointed out that the most encroached areas are Toro, Pontian Blooms and Lubuk Batu Jaya as well as Bagan Limau in Ukui district.

The Tesso Nilo National Park is a lowland conservation area which is a native habitat for about 100 Sumatran elephants (Elephant maximus sumatranus).

The Ministry of Forestry declared Tesso Nilo as a national park on July 19, 2004.
Initially the area was 38,576 hectares and in 2009 it was expanded to 83,000 hectares. However, about 30 percent or 28,000 hectares have been damaged due to trampling.