Guinness Book of World Records

Indonesia has entered the Guinness Book of World Records for the second year in a row... But for being the country with the highest rate of deforestation.

These record rates of destruction make Indonesia not only the fastest forest destroyer but also the world's number one greenhouse gas polluter. They destroy an area that is the equivalent to 300 soccer fields every hour! Illegal logging can be blamed for the forest depletion, as 73% of logging done in Indonesia is illegal so that oil palm plantations can be established.

As a result of this, Indonesia has the third highest number of threatened species, with 772 species. One of these species being the orangutan. The orangutan is on virtually every international top ten endangered animals list. Only two species of orangutan remain on earth, the Bornean orangutan and the Sumatran orangutan. In the 1990’s there were more than 230,000 orangutans wandering freely, but today there are merely 60,000 of them left in total.

“The survival of orangutans and other rainforest wildlife in Indonesia is seriously endangered by illegal logging, forest fires, including those associated with the rapid spread of oil palm plantations, illegal hunting and trade.” -United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP)