These are more than 17,500 islands in Indonesia, strechted out along the equator like green, ruby and bronze beads of an exquisite necklace. These islands are endowed with vast biological diversity, and approximately one third of the huge number of spieces found on them are endemic. Indonesia stil has one of the largets remaining tropical rainforest in the world, many of which are managed as conservation area. Unfotunately these gifts from nature have been greatly damaged by three decades of exploitation.Indonesia’s forests are being degraded and destroyed by logging, mining operations and large-scale agricultural plantations, and from time to time the regime of government always blame the indigenous and local people for shifting agriculture and cutting for fuelwood. I don’t believe that colonization, and subsistence activities cause a major problem of this issue. Their culture is to maintain close links between nature and life as they believe nature will protect them.
