Case study 1: Saving the forests in Tesso Nilo, Sumatra

Among the world’s hotspots, Sumatra is generally regarded as containing some of the world’s richest forests. But until recently there has never been a systematic survey of Sumatran vegetation. In 2002 a survey conducted in Riau Sumatra, by CBM for WWF-Indonesia recorded a staggering 218 species in a single 200m2 plot.

This is by far and above the highest record of species for any plot world wide using this method. Within the transect, the first quadrat (5x5m) contained 66 mostly woody species. The results of the survey led the Indonesian Government initially to declare a logging moratorium of the area that was being heavily logged by a pulp and paper company. A follow up survey by Indonesian zoologists confirmed the overall biodiversity richness as being the highest in Sumatra. These findings led to a subsequent proposal by the Indonesian Government for the area to be set aside for conservation purposes with the ultimate aim of being declared a national park. Given the widely known difficulties in adopting any conservation measure in the face of industrial logging interests in Indonesia this has been a major plus for conservation.

Reports outlining the reults of this study are available at:

Tesso Nilo report pdf