Asia-Pacific leaders to cut taxes on green goods

Asia-Pacific leaders representing more than half of the global economy committed Sunday to cutting tariffs on environmental goods to no more than five percent and reducing energy intensity.

In a joint statement after a summit in Hawaii, leaders of the APEC bloc -- which includes the United States and China -- said they would also eliminate non-tariff barriers that impede trade in green products.

Tapirs on the brink of extinction

THE Malayan tapir (Tapirus indicus) is the largest of the world’s four tapir species. The other three species – lowland, mountain and Baird’s – are found in Central and South America. Once distributed over South-East Asia, the Malayan tapir is now confined to Peninsular Malaysia, Sumatra in Indonesia, Thailand and Myanmar, and continues to decline in numbers in all four countries.

“Only the first two countries have significant populations and habitat remaining. The decline in population is the result of continued habitat loss from illegal logging and the lack of protection of most areas still containing significant populations,” says Dr Alan Shoemaker at a tapir symposium in Kuala Lumpur last month.

Tapirs losing out

BENDUL, the Malayan tapir, is a sorry sight. Unlike the other tapirs at the Sungai Dusun Wildlife Conservation Centre which have hefty, robust bodies, Bendul is almost all skin and bones. Her coat is dull and grey, not a healthy shine like that on the others. Her ribcage shows under her skin and her body is badly scarred.
She was named after the place where she was found loitering in late September, a village in Ulu Bendul some 16km from Seremban in Negri Sembilan, and arrived at the centre wounded and starving.
“After trapping her, we had planned to return her to the forest but when we saw that she had a bullet wound which was infested with maggots, we decided to bring her here,” says Mahathir Mohamad who heads the Sungai Dusun centre, located in the upper reaches of Selangor about 90 minutes’ drive from Kuala Lumpur.

Wild fodder: At the Sungai Dusun Wildlife Conservation Centre, the seven tapirs there are fed leaves collected from the jungle.

From the tell-tale size and shape of the wound, wildlife officers believe Bendul had been shot by wild boar hunters, probably mistakenly. “Villagers say they have seen the tapir with two young. We searched but could not find the juveniles. We believe they have also been shot,” says Mahathir.

At Sungai Dusun, a 4,330ha sprawl of protected peatswamp and lowland dipterocarp forest near the Selangor-Perak boundary which is both a rescue and captive breeding centre, Bendul is seen chomping on the leaves of the mengkirai, nangka and mahang trees which keepers have collected from the forest. Soon, she will be fed nutrition-laden pellets to fatten her up. At the centre, she joins six other tapirs – four of which are captive-breds and two, also rescued tapirs.