KOTA KINABALU: An ecological corridor in Lahad Datu’s Bagahak area is being restored to give wildlife an unbroken route between the Tabin Wildlife Reserve and Silabukan Forest Reserve.

       WWF-Malaysia’s orang utan conservation manager Donna Simon said the 5km corridor, which is 200m wide on average, will serve as an important route for elephants, orang utan and other species.

       The RM1.38mil restoration project by WWF-Malaysia is expected to take five years.

       Currently, no orang utan has been spotted in the Bagahak corridor as it is still an open area with fragmented riparian forests along the small river, she said, hence the need to restore the degraded forests there.

       “The ecological corridor will ensure that both regular movements and periodic migrations of wildlife are unrestricted by human activities.

       “There is an estimate of about 1,000 orang utan in the Tabin Wildlife Reserve and about 50 in the Silabukan Forest Reserve, so the connectivity of both forests is crucial to maintain gene flow between the two populations.

       “Apart from the orang utan, a group of elephants has also been seen using the riparian area to move from Tabin to Silabukan and back,” she said in a statement on Wednesday (Aug 18) dealing with conservation efforts for orang utan.

       WWF-Malaysia Conservation Director Dr Henry Chan added that forest restoration is among the key efforts in conserving the orang utan population.

       Trees are important for the species not only as shelter but also as a food source and means of travel, he said.

       “In order to secure the survival of the orang utan, there is a need to ensure that the habitat can support them and degraded habitats are restored,” he added.

       One successful example of forest restoration is the Bukit Piton Forest Reserve, also in Lahad Datu, he said.

       Home to some 300 orang utan, Bukit Piton was a severely degraded forest because of extensive and unsustainable logging practices in the 1980s.

       WWF-Malaysia and the Sabah Forestry Department spearheaded the restoration programme there in 2007.

       According to Simon, the restoration efforts took over a decade to complete and by 2019, 2,400ha of Bukit Piton Forest Reserve had been restored.

       “Moreover, baby orang utan have also been sighted there, evidence that the species is now thriving where it was once grasping desperately for survival,” she said.