Helping orangutans

I wonder whether James Fair’s article on orangutans (The $80 million question, April 2021) isn’t unduly optimistic, particularly in its upbeat final paragraph, which read: “Neither Bornean nor Sumatran orangutans are going extinct at any time soon.”

All three orangutan species are Critically Endangered, the last category before Extinct in the Wild on the IUCN Red List. The article found no space for this scientific assessment, using vague terms like "any time soon" to suggest the ‘palm oil campaigners’ (whose views were not reported in the piece) are wrong and we mustn’t blame palm oil.

The article omitted to say that the main conservationist quoted, Erik Meijaard, has been paid for work for an oil palm company, and chairs the IUCN Oil Palm Task Force. He may well be entirely correct, but the article seemed to be selective.

Paul Seligman, Cardiff

James Fair replies:

These are fair points, but I wonder how many people understand the technical terms. The article set out clearly how many orangutans are left and what their rate of decline is, which I decided was more helpful. Erik Meijaard has worked with the palm oil industry to reduce its impacts, but there was no room to go into the pros and cons of this.

I enjoy James Fair’s articles as they ask difficult questions about conservation problems, and his orangutan feature was no exception. The research on the impact of palm oil versus hunting was eye-opening.

The solution offered of making direct payments to farmers not to kill apes sits uneasily with me. What happens when the money runs out, or if the non-governmental organisation moves on to more trendy projects? This is neither