KOTA KINABALU: Despite the global economic gloom, Sabah’s efforts to protect and conserve the endangered Borneo rhinoceros received a RM500,000 shot in the arm during a recent fund-raising event.
Businessmen, individuals and interest groups dug deep into their pockets to support the newly formed Borneo Rhino Alliance (Bora) to carry out conservation efforts and save some 30 rhinos.
State Tourism, Culture and Environment Minister Datuk Masidi Manjun, who had coaxed businessmen to help in the cause, described the efforts as a “last chance to save one of the world’s most endangered mammals.”
Preserving wildlife: In this undated photo, a Borneo Sumatran male rhino nicknamed 'Tam', was rescued from an estate in the east coast of Sabah.-AP Bora is a local non-governmental organisation formed in December last year after SOS Borneo Rhino ceased operations in Sabah in June.
The funds will be used to operate its base camps at the Tabin Wildlife Reserve as well as finance 17 staff members and other operations.
Bora chairman Junaidi Payne told guests attending the Rhino Rescue Lunch yesterday that Borneo rhino conservation efforts needed about RM500,000 a year and that they were working against time to conserve the rhinos whose numbers had dwindled to only about 30 to 35 on Borneo island.
He said Tabin Wildlife Reserve was home to about 15 Rhinos with the rest distributed in the Danum Valley and other areas.
He said an injured rhino rescued from an estate in the east coast of Sabah last year, named “Tam”, would be sent back to the wild.
This article was taken from: The star online: nation 18 March 2009
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