Lone Droscher-Nielsen

Lone Droscher-Nielsen is a Danish expatriate and former airline hostess who volunteered at an orangutan sanctuary for four years before establishing the Nyaru Menteng Orangutan Reintroduction Project in 1999. Her rescue-and-rehabilitation centre cares for orangutans that have been displaced by the fires or attacked by palm oil plantation workers.

Lone hopes to return them all to the wild, but this difficult task is exacerbated by the fact that the burning season occurs without fail every year. In 2006, over 5,000 orangutans were displaced or burned to death by the fires. Lone’s facility at Nyaru Menteng is stretched to the limit, housing over 600 of the gentle primates. She is determined to raise awareness about their plight, and she is desperate to stop the fires.

The destruction caused by the big government-sanctioned palm oil plantations is of particular concern to Lone: “If we just close our eyes and say, ‘those big plantations right now that already have the permits, that are going to be cutting down forests for the next five or six years, what are we going to do with those orangutans? Are we just going to let them get killed out there? For me, it’s genocide, because they’re so close to us.”

Lone lives at the sanctuary, sponsored by the Borneo Orangutan Survival Foundation (BOS). Aside from her staff and her beloved animal friends, she doesn’t have much company in Nyaru Menteng in her uphill battle against habitat destruction.

“Once you’re here, you can’t seem to get away from it,” she says. “There are days where I think, ‘I’m out of here. I don’t want to do it anymore.’ Then I look at the little ones and think, ’what’s going to happen to them if I go?” I think I’d hate myself forever if I left.”

While Lone tries to heal the animals in her care, her former colleague Hardi wants to prevent the problem at its source. He feels that capturing and rehabilitating the orangutans is like mopping up a leaking tap, and he wants to stop the leak in the first place. This means tussling with the palm oil corporations… so Hardi has a battle on his hands.

Find out more about the rehabilitation centre Nyaru Menteng, founded in 1999 by Lone.