Anita Rachman – In the heart of Sumatra, amid the forests, farmlands and rural villages, a disturbing turf war is raging between humans and animals for dwindling space and natural resources.
The dispute has exposed the ugly side of human nature – illegal logging, land clearance, poaching and corruption – but has also brought out the basic instincts of some of Sumatra's most critically endangered species.
On Monday morning, the battled erupted again, and once again ended in death, when a Sumatran tiger killed two men in a forest in Jambi Province's Muarojambi district.
Didy Wurdjanto, head of the Jambi Natural Resource Conservation Body, said he suspected the victims were outsiders who were illegally logging in the forest near Sungai Gelam village.
The fatality scorecard since January now stands at: tigers 4, humans 8. In addition, two women were trampled to death in late January by a pair of elephants in Aceh Province, which itself has seen increasing conflicts between people and pachyderms.
The tiger who killed Musmuliadi, 31, and Musliadi, 30, on Monday morning was not protecting the forests from the two men. It was protecting itself, which is an increasingly difficult job in Sumatra these days. Local and international conservation groups say there's less than 500 wild tigers left in Indonesia, mostly in south and central Sumatra, with a lone one believed to be in western Sumatra.
Local residents have nonetheless trapped and killed four "man-eating" tigers this year, despite warnings by the central government, while eight people have died and two others survived their encounters with a tiger. Among the victims was a 17-year-old boy from Lampung Province, whose body was dragged off on Feb. 22 and found the next day.
Direct conflicts between people and animals is occurring because human development is encroaching on the habitat of wild animals, affecting their food sources, hunting grounds and breeding areas, said Desmarita Murni, communication manager of the Indonesian branch of World Wide Fund for Nature.
She said forest cover in Sumatra was 25 million hectares in 1985, but by 2007 it had fallen to 13 million hectares due to illegal logging and land clearance, and the expansion of the palm oil industry and other agribusiness.
[Additional reporting by Antara.]