A lack of available habitat means that nearly 150 orang-utans from a rehabilitation centre are remaining in captivity even though they have been deemed ready to be released back into the wild.

The Borneo Orang-utan Survival(BOS) Foundation has already released 300 orang-utans from its different rehabilitation centres in Kalimantan, but says it is running out of suitable habitat.

There are currently 611 orang-utans being housed in cages measuring 2-by-2 meters at the Nyaru Menteng Centre. Of these 141 have now gone through the various stages that prepare them for release back into the wild.

To qualify for release, orang-utans must first enter a quarantine phase, in which they are given a health check and tested for a variety of human diseases that the species is vulnerable to, including hepatitis, tuberculosis and HIV.

Next, the animals enter a reorientation stage, where they are taught how to survive in the forest, build nests, find their own food and recognize predators and other threats.

Orang-utans younger than three years old spend their days in the forest under the supervision of baby sitters.

The final stage is meant to be the release, in which the orang-utans are introduced into habitats where there is no wild population of the animal.

Jhon Leo, head caretaker at Nyaru Menteng, says the 141 orang-utans were unable to complete the final phase because there was nowhere to release them.

“The orang-utans are already wild, but we have to keep them in cages because we don’t have anywhere suitable in which to release them,” he said.

The Forestry Ministry has issued permits for orang-utan release areas to Restorasi Habitat Orang-utan Indonesia, a company set up by BOS to manage 86,450 hectares of forest previously logged by the Mugitriman logging company in East Kutai.

It allocated another 20,000 hectares in the same district previously logged by another company, Narkata Rimba.

BOS chairman Togu Manurung says the foundation will start releasing the orang-utans into these new areas later this year.

“We have around 800 orang-utans in two rehabilitation centres,” he said. “We have around 200 at our Samboja Lestari centre, about an hour’s drive from Balikpapan [East Kalimantan], and around 600 at Nyaru Menteng.”

The first animals to be released will be a batch of 24 from Nyaru Menteng, Togu said.

“In East Kalimantan, we plan to release five orang-utans in April 2011, and continue releasing more up until 2015,” he said.

The 2015 deadline to release all orang-utans at rehabilitation centres back into the wild is stipulated in the Orang-utan National Action of Plan, drafted in 2007.

Togu said this would be the BOS Foundation’s first string of releases since 2002.

Efforts to meet this target would be boosted if 162,000 hectares of forest in Central Kalimantan were to become allocated as permitted release areas. Of that figure, 94,000 hectares are managed by Akhates Plywood and the rest are managed by Tunggul Pemenang, both logging companies. But in a visit to the rehabilitation centre this week, Forestry Minister Zulkifli Hasan marked this land out as suitable for become a release area for the Orangutans.

With both logging and palm oil companies coming under pressure from governments and NGOs to halt the rampant destruction of the rainforests of Indonesia, there is hope that the worrying decline of Orang-utan populations can be halted.

Among those most vociferous in petitioning governments, and providing resources for recover projects is WWF. In order for them to continue their excellent work though, they require your help. One of the best ways that you can help them save the orang-utans is by adopting one of them today. For more information on how to get involved, click on the button below.