Indonesia-SE-Asia
Pacific-Asian or Indo-Malaysian territories rank fourth in the world for the number of ecological hotspots given priority by biologists as key for the preservation of biodiversity.
Prior to colonization, Indonesian lands throughout the Pacific represented an unbroken canopy of pristine forests. Forest in Indonesia once blanketed 90 percent of the total land mass. “Indonesia's forests now cover less than one-half of the country.
With deforestation exceeding 1 million hectares yearly (almost two and a half million acres), the remaining 90 to 100 million hectares of forest are being destroyed rapidly.”7 This 1% rate of annual deforestation coincides with extinction events concurrent within the Amazon Basin.
Trends in ecological devastation throughout South East Asia, by comparison (to Indo-Malaysia), show similar patterns of reckless mismanagement. “Some scientists estimate the loss of original habitat as high as 80 percent in Vietnam and the Philippines, and between 50 to 70 percent in Indonesia, Laos, Thailand, and Cambodia.”6
The Indo-Malaysian eco-regions contain the highest percentage of the number of Indigenous people living in any part of the world, excepting Nearctic regions (90%); which amounts to 76%. Following Oceana and the Nearctic, ecological cohabitation by Indigenous peoples in High Priority Biodiversity Regions of the Earth, Indo-Malaysia ranks 3rd. 88% of these High Priority Ecoregions are inhabited by Indigenous peoples.
Ecological data drawn from forests subject to indigenous management systems show that these forests retain upwards to 80 percent of the biodiversity found in neighboring natural forest ecosystems.5
That Indigenous managed forests throughout Indo-Malaysia do not show an anticipated increase, or perfect maintenance, of biodiversity status when contrasted with natural forest ecosystems in the surrounding areas may be, in part, accounted for due to external market pressures and the dwindling territory of 298 indigenous groups; compacted into 21 of the 24 healthy eco-regions that once characterized the whole of Indo-Malaysia.
