Coal highway in Sumatra destroying valuable wildlife habitat
- Posted
Coal highway through Sumatran forest threatens wildlife and people. Sun >bears, black with bright yellow patches on their chests, are among hundreds of vulnerable species threatened by the plans of Indonesian mining companies to build a highway through the forest in Jambi and South Sumatra provinces. >Other species threatened by the road include elephants and Sumatran tigers, both of which the IUCN has listed as critically endangered. Only around 400 Sumatran tigers are thought to survive in the wild, in a small area of the island. Three coal-mining companies — PT Triaryani, PT Gorby Putra Utama, and PT Barasentosa Lestari — own mining concessions covering a combined area of more than 30,000 hectares in the North Musi Rawas region of South Sumatra, with coal reserves of around 1 billion metric tonnes. The coal is primarily exported to China and India. In 2017, Indonesia shipped 109 million metric tonnes to China, 40.2% of China’s coal import total and more than any other exporting nation. In 2018, this grew to 125 million tonnes – 25% of Indonesia’s coal exports. Why do China and India continue to damage our world so much by continuing to burn such huge amounts of fossil fuel when other natural alternatives such solar power, wind turbines, etc are fossil free? See link below to read more on this report.