Study Says Orangutans Could Be First Of Extinct Great Apes

Bangkok, Thailand (AHN) -- A new study says that orangutans are on the road to being the first of the Great Apes to face extinction, as their populations continue to slowly decline despite conservation efforts.

Illegal logging and the expansion of palm oil plantations are two of the main causes for the destruction of orangutan's habitat. Both practices are becoming more prominent in Borneo and Sumatra, the Indonesian and Malaysian Islands where orangutans live.

With an estimated 53,000 to 54,000 Orangutans left in the wild, The Great Ape Trust in Iowa predicts if things stay on their current course, that the Sumatran primates may be extinct in ten years.

Since 2004, their population has dwindled by 14 percent on the island of Sumatra, and by 10 percent in Borneo.

Besides habitat loss, orangutans are also hunted, traded or smuggled to be used as pets.

Conservationists reportedly say that they have some optimism about the situation since the Indonesian president announced plans to take steps to preserve the populations of the Great Apes, and to impose a logging moratorium.

Those measures combined with a proposed pact with the United Nations that will go into effect in 2012, protecting millions of acres of rainforest in efforts to stave off the impending climate crisis, may serve to protect the endangered species.