VOI - Voice of Indonesia | RRI - Radio Republik Indonesia

In today’s edition, we will bring you a topic about the successful breeding of Sumatran tigers in the wild.

To commemorate the Global Tiger Day on 29^th July, the World Wildlife Fund of Indonesia (WWF Indonesia) in collaboration with the Ministry of Environment and Forestry of Indonesia released a rare documentary video demonstrating the successful breeding of tigers in the wild. Through a press release on Sunday morning (29^th July 2018), Head of Tigers Alive Initiative, Michael Baltzer explained that as the main predator in food chain, tigers have significant role to maintain the ecosystem balance in a bid to sustain the lives of other species and human beings. However, currently tigers are in critical status.

Michael Baltzer said that currently, there are only 3,900 species of wild tigers in this world and compared to last year, these tigers could only be found about 5% from their observation.

Michael Baltzer added that as a fact, a video showcasing fascinating evidences and proofing this carnivore’s breed has already been released. Tigers breed similarly like cats on condition that the tigers have protected habitat, enough prey, and they are not hunted. He also stated that it takes a lot of time to accomplish the goals of TX2. This means that assistance from the government, businesspeople, local people, and everyone who cares about tigers is required to support the tiger conservation efforts. Therefore, Michael and his team truly appreciate the efforts of Indonesian government to save this extraordinary species.

Furthermore, Director of Sumatera and Wildlife, World Wide Fund (WWF Indonesia), Suhandri said that the video showing the breed of tigers proved Sumatran tigers to be healthy since they could breed well and are appropriate to inhabit the environment of Central Sumatera.

Suhandri also pointed out that the successful breeding of Sumatran tigers reflects strong commitment from the government of the Republic of Indonesia as well as supports from community partners, regional government, and international communities to save tigers and their habitat. The restoration of tigers’ population is a key point for mankind to live properly with the availability of natural resources.

Meanwhile, Head of the Nature Conservation Agency of Riau at the Ministry of Environment and Forestry, Suharyono stated that his Ministry has set a target to increase the tigers’ population up to 25% among the 25 endangered species in accordance to the government’s Performance Indicator mandated by the Directorate General for Natural Resource and Ecosystem Conservation. Illegal trade still remains the greatest threat for tigers to survive in the wild. The illegal trade chain is built up long from the source to the final recipient. Laws must be enacted. Crimes against wildlife and pertaining to corruption must be abolished.

The Global Tiger Day is commemorated every 29^th July. It was firstly initiated at Saint Petersburg’s Tiger Summit in 2010. The purpose of commemorating the World Tiger Day is to raise the awareness of tiger conservation efforts.