In 2009, I met Benoit Goossens, Biologist, who has a Scientific Research Center in the middle of the forest on the island of Borneo.

The idea was to see how biologists, students, researchers from all over the world, complete their studies and participate in research programs (study what animal population lives around, retrieve precise data with GPS markup, take photos, ... in short make a general state of affairs to better protect the ecosystem afterwards).

These students stay a lot of time here. The center is 2 hours of canoe from the first big city, Sandankan. Must have good health!

I arrived at night surrounded by crocs that were dazzled by the beam of the projector of the boat (immediately in the mood!). There is no animal contact in this center, it is not welfare (direct care) but we were surrounded by orangutans, pygmy elephants, snakes, spiders, ...

I stayed 10 days, to observe especially, also participate in GPS counting, follow Night Walk (hear the night steps;)) to recover the trap cameras that had been placed the day. I met an English student who was studying the "sound" of the forest, rubbing shoulders with a nature photographer, following these scientific defenders passionate about their environment ...

A very rewarding experience. If you want to see a video that shows the places go down lower.

After this dive in the middle of the forest I'm back in Sandankan, a nice little town where a lot of religion mixes. My next goal was to visit SEPILOK, the largest Orangutan Rehabilitation Center in the world. You are surely aware of the plague affecting this area of ​​the globe: palm oil. Cheap oil, used by our industries and which devastates every year billions of hectares of forests, destroying the only habitat of an already fragile biodiversity. The area equivalent to 1 woodland football field is razed for palm oil every 3 minutes in Kalimantan. The authors estimated that oil palm plantations are directly responsible for 57% of deforestation between 2000 and 2010 in Kalimantan (15 949 km² - a region like Franche-Comté).

A tip look at the labels of your food (Nutella is to banish).

The movie "GREEN" by Patrick Rouxel shows very sensitively this planetary mess! (See the video, do not hesitate to broadcast it.)

The link of the Scientific Center:
http://www.cardiff.ac.uk/danau-girang-field-centre

The SEPILOK Center link:
https://www.orangutan-appeal.org.uk/about-us/sepilok-rehabilitation-centre

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