FOUR PAWS helps Orang-utans in need
The Borneo Orangutan Survival Foundation (BOS) operates rehabilitation centres and sanctuaries for orangutans and other endangered animals. FOUR PAWS supports BOS’ aid programs: At the Samboja sanctuary (Borneo) orangutans who have been injured, abused or confiscated from private owners are being cared for and prepared for a life in freedom.
 The escalating environmental destruction in Indonesia causes misery, fatal danger and death to hundreds of orangutans every year. Orangutans are starving because of illegal logging, or dying in the forest fires that are the result of human activity and which devastates Indonesia. They are being shot or clubbed to death, cut up with machetes, while surviving babies are captured for the illicit pet trade or the entertainment industry.
FOUR PAWS is supporting the Orangutan Rescue and Rehabilitation Program of the Borneo Orangutan Survival Foundation (BOS) in Indonesia. BOS rescues stranded orangutans, confiscates in cooperation with the authorities illegally kept or traded orangutans, and re-homes them to BOS sanctuaries. Once rescued, these apes are in need of medical care to overcome physical abuse, injuries and starvation.
 The psychological scars inflicted by the trauma of capture and bereavement require treatment to heal. During their first years of life apes are just as dependent on maternal care and love as human babies. As rescued orphans no longer have mothers, human substitute mothers are introduced, but young orangutans still socialize and play with other orphans. Later, they attend Forest School to learn the skills and cultural knowledge needed to survive in the forest. Once fit and capable, the orangutans are released back into the wild, in protected forests where they are monitored from afar.
In danger of extinction
 Because orangutan food is scarce, adult orangutans prefer to seek out food alone by roaming large areas. This reduces competition between the Orangutans.. Orangutans are smart, memorizing what type of food grows where, and at what time of year; they also use tools to get food that would otherwise be inaccessible. Due to their intelligence and need for solitude orangutans are unsuited for a life in captivity. Maintaining rescued orangutans in human care cannot, therefore, be the solution to human encroachment and habitat destruction. This means that helping to restore the wellbeing of orangutans and the conservation of their forests must go hand in hand. In a shocking report UNEP predicted the extinction of orangutans in the course of the next 10 years - Unless we take action!
Ecocide
In addition to orangutan protection BOS and its founder, Dr. Willie Smits are committed to global climate protection: They conduct reforestation projects and CO2 trade, while advocating environmental education and employment programs for the local communities. By employing more than 400 people, BOS is boosting the local job market.
 Each year, two million hectares of rain forest are being destroyed in Indonesia, with catastrophic consequences for orangutans, humankind and the world climate. As a result of logging and draining, peat forests dry up and regularly ignite, causing devastating forest fires. Although Indonesia has little industrial pollution, the country accumulates the third largest emission of greenhouse gases worldwide! The peat in the swamps harbours such immense amounts of CO2 that their release in fires causes a much greater damage to the environment than could ever be compensated by the use of bio fuels.
Only the conservation and reforestation of the woodland paired with a simultaneous reduction of CO2 emission can prevent the massive global ecological disasters resulting from climate change. Bio fuel from palm-oil is no solution.
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