Week6 : 'Heart' of the Earth Faces Deforestation Threat

A view in November 2016 of land cleared for palm oil plantations inside the Leuser ecosystem, habitat of the Sumatran orangutan. (Photo by Ulet Ifansasti/Getty Images)

I came across with an article on the newspaper today, it is about the importance of Leuser ecosystem. Indonesia is a country which vital to the survival of wildlife and it is important to people's livelihoods. Leuser ecosytem is a world unto itself which has a rich lowland jungle, cloud draped mountains and steamy peat lands. Leuser's forests are the most ancient on earth where volcanic eruptions, fluctuating sea levels and species migrations occurred throughout the years. 

The Leuser contains plenty of plants and animals abundance, and the clear water able to provide millions of local people with clean drinking water, cooking water and most importantly for agriculture such as rice. cocoa, palm oil and other cultivation vital to local economies.  

Location of Leuser ecosystem in Indonesia

Leuser acts as an important role to control our global climate, it is providing the largest integral forest in Southeast Asia. The forests absorbing the carbon dioxide produced by the people and release more oxygen to the environment, which mitigating the problem of global climate change by reducing the pollution out of the atmosphere in the world.

Unfortunately, the Leuser's forest face a growing threat, due to massive deforestation in Indonesia. It caused unintended change in the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, by cutting down massive area of forest without replacing the trees we had removed. Deforestation affect the environmental and increased disasters such as major floods in rural area, landslides and drought in urban city.

As local communities should keep he Leuser ecosystem undamaged and vigorous as a matter of economic survival. The environmental services such as wildlife species, water supplies and various plantations are the dominant needs to the people living around it. To achieve that, everyone in the world should understand and know more about Leuser ecosystem to appreciate its importance to the environmental and global climate change.

We must put on our afford and will be pride in the future for what we can prevent the current crisis facing Leuser, instead of being apologies to our future generations for what has been lost.



References:
https://www.usnews.com/news/best-countries/articles/2017-04-05/sumatras-leuser-ecosystem-faces-threat-from-deforestation
https://www.ran.org/lastplaceonearth
https://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2016/01/28/18782330.php
https://www.nature.com/articles/srep18490