4 pages essay

Case Study: Bukit Lawang, Sumatra, Indonesia

Bukit Lawang is one of the active ecotourism villages in North Sumatra of Indonesia located west of Medan city. Bukit Lawang village hosts an orang-utan rehabilitation center. The center was created in 1973 with support from WWF and Indonesia’s Nature Conservation Service. The aim was to rehabilitate the decline of orangutan which was widely targeted and traded. Rehabilitated species are then re- integrated in to the forest ecosystem. The rehabilitation center has become a major tourism attraction starting 1974. In 1976, about 4,000 tourists visited the center, which increased to 11,325 by 1989, and over 18,000 visitors by 1992. The number since then has rapidly increased. By 1997, over 8,000 visitors came to the rehabilitation center at the weekends.

There was adequate buffer between the rehabilitation center and Bukit Lawang separated by dense forest. Rapid increase in tourists and visitors, however, resulted in numerous development activities that reduced the size of the buffer forest. The rapid increase in ecotourism resulted in noise, litter and the increased risk of epidemic diseases. Additionally, rehabilitated apes failed to self-support in the rainforest due to human feeding and human dependence. As a result of these developments, the Ministry of Forestry decreed the orang-utan center to close down as a rehabilitation center.

The rapid increase of ecotourism also contributed to biodiversity damage resulting from the overuse of trails as well as reduced the habitat area for animal species. Similarly, local targeting of species for sale to tourists and to local markets threatened the sustainable rehabilitation of species in the ecosystem. Animals wandering outside the ecosystem are targeted for sale in nearby communities.

Rapid tourism expansion also led in the 1980s and 1990s to the development of hotels, restaurants, and other tourism-related enterprises. The use of local construction material from river beds and forests diminished the quality and value of the ecosystem as a tourism site.

Source:

Thompson, I. and Christophersen, T., eds. (2008). Cross-sectoral Toolkit for the Conservation and Sustainable Management of Forest Biodiversity

, Secretariat of the Convention on Biological Diversity, Technical Series no. 39, Montreal, Canada, 53 pages.

The exam question relating to this case study will refer to environmental planning and management of tourism in the context of Bukit Lawang. You will benefit from reading the chapter emailed to you and placed on blackboard in preparation for the exam. You may also wish to do some of your own extra research on Bukit Lawang.