Love Me, Love My Tiger

I presume it's a mere coincidence that today is St.Valentine's Day as well as being Hari Raya Imlek, the first day of China's Year of the Tiger.

One must hope that among the feasts and festivities, there won't be any tiger body parts consumed.

Tiger parts such as skin and bones are mostly used in traditional medicine purportedly to cure ailments from convulsions to skin disease, and increase sexual potency.

If such strange consumption continues, there is the very real danger that come 2022, the next Year of the Tiger, there won't be any left, at least in the wild.

A couple of weeks ago, on January 13, countries agreed to save wild tigers - possibly (hopefully?) at the expense of tiger farms, another Chinese innovation but now also found in Laos, Vietnam and Thailand.

I left a message on the Jakarta Post about the plan because their - erm - post wasn't clear about which countries had signed up.

A dozen Asian nations and Russia vowed Friday to work to double the number of wild tigers by 2022, crack down on poaching that has devastated the big cats and prohibit the building of roads and bridges that could harm their habitats.

I've since found the following, fuller, version of the article.

The 13 nations attending the meeting [were] Bangladesh, Bhutan, Cambodia, China, India, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Nepal, Russia, Thailand and Vietnam.

So, that's all right then?

Hardly.

The historic declaration adopted by the 13 countries that have wild tigers includes no new money to finance the conservation efforts.

The agreement only includes plans to approach international institutions like the World Bank for money and to develop schemes to tap money from ecotourism, carbon financing and infrastructure projects to pay for tiger programs.

The Worldwide Fund for Nature predicts that Sumatran tigers (Panthera tigris sumatrae) may by extinct by 2015 due to poaching and loss of habitat.

Riau-based WWF official Osmantri said, “Destroyed ecosystems, which hamper the tigers’ ability to reproduce, will likely be an initial cause of the extinction. This condition may occur in the next five years.”

Such is the urgency that the countries don't intend meeting until September, in Vladivostok, Russia.

Still, at least things should get better for tigers here in Indonesia.

On the sidelines of the National Nature Conservation Day event at the presidential palace in Jakarta on Jan. 22, Forestry Minister Zulkifli Hasan said his office was studying plans to issue tiger adoption licenses to wealthy Indonesian citizens and corporations.

And why not, eh?

The Director General of Forest Protection and Nature Conservation, Darori, is quoted as saying “there are many orders from rich people who want them, who feel if they own a tiger they are a big shot” and also says “And because these people are rich, they will definitely give them good food.”

Of course they will.

And just to demonstrate how well-meaning these rich folk are, Kusbanu Hadi Soemarto has had two tigers in his home in Tangerang, to the west of Jakarta, for 20 years.

When asked to turn them over to the Forestry Ministry, he said, "Mine are Bengal tigers, not Sumatran tigers."

So should be all right then. Well, at least until September when India and Bangladesh meet up with the other 11 countries.

You may now be thinking that this post is not quite in keeping with St.Valentine's Day sentiments. Don't worry because I've come across a review of a Love Calculator phone application which only costs 99c - that's less than Rp.10,000!

I found it on the "Home of Crap Apps".

You can probably also download a ringtone of a fading tiger roar.