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Magazine
ECOWATCH
Primates in peril
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Habitat destruction, hunting and war are responsible for the dwindling numbers of primates. N.N. SACHITANAND looks at the state of this threatened species.
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S. MAHINSHA
The Lion-tailed macaque ....
ALARM bells are ringing all over the world at the critical status of our closest relatives in the animal world — non-human primates. Nearly 25 species of apes, monkeys, lemurs, and other primates are imperilled and may soon disappear.
The main causes of decimation of primates are the destruction of habitat, hunting for meat and skin, for body parts used in traditional medicines as well as the animals' capture for the pet trade and export for biomedical research. Primates are particularly vulnerable to hunting because of their relatively large body size, low reproductive rates, and large group size. Often, conflict among humans takes their toll of non-human primates as collateral damage. The Mountain Gorillas of Central Africa were killed in large numbers during the fratricidal wars in Rwanda and Burundi a few years ago.
Habitat disturbance and shrinkage are considered as the primary threats to most vertebrate populations including primates. The 20th Century has seen the disappearance of about half of the Earth's original forest cover, mainly due to human incursions in the form of logging, mining, agriculture, and war.
The vast majority of total forest cover loss in the last decade occurred in just eight countries: Brazil, China, Indonesia, Sudan, Zambia, Mexico, the Democratic Republic of Congo, and Myanmar. These, incidentally, are the countries that have the largest number of endangered primate species.
The International Union of Conservation of Nature (IUCN) releases once every four years a Red List of Threatened Species, which is considered the most authoritative and comprehensive status assessment of global bio-diversity. The Red List report uses scientific criteria to classify species into one of eight categories: "Extinct", "Extinct in the Wild", "Critically Endangered", "Endangered", "Vulnerable", "Lower Risk", "Data Deficient" and "Not Evaluated". A species is classed as threatened if it falls in the Critically Endangered, Endangered, or Vulnerable categories.
According to the last Red List, released in March 2004, nearly 30 per cent of the primate species are in the threatened category. This includes 21 species "Critically Endangered", 47 "Endangered" and 47 "Vulnerable".
The most endangered primates, according to a study by Conservation International, include the golden bamboo lemur in Madagascar, the yellow-tailed woolly monkey in the tropical Andes, the mountain gorilla in central Africa and the Tonkin snub-nosed monkey of Vietnam.
Besides these, other primates on the critical list are:
The Lac Alaotra bamboo Lemur, the Perrier's Sifaka, the silky Sifaka and the golden-crowned Sifaka, all in Madagascar and the Indian Ocean islands;
The golden lion Tamarin, the black lion Tamarin, the black-faced lion Tamarin, the buff-headed Capuchin and the northern Muriqui, all in Brazil;
The Miss Waldron's red Colobus, white-naped Mangabey, Sclater's Guenon, the drill Gorilla, and the cross-river Gorilla, all in West Africa;
The Sanje Mangabey in Kenya and Tanzania; the Delacour's Langur, Cat Ba Island golden-headed Langur and the gray-shanked Douc Langur, all in Vietnam;
The Hainan gibbon in China; and the Sumatran orangutan and the Javan gibbon, both in Indonesia;
The red-shanked Douc Langur , an Asian Colobine monkey found in south central Viet Nam and parts of neighbouring Laos;
The variegated Spider Monkey of Peru and Venezuela;
The blond Ttiti and the Comibra Filho's Titi of the Amazon and Orinoco basins in South America;
The broad-nosed gentle Lemur of Madagascar;
The Mentawai Macaque of the Medntawai islands off the coast of Sumatra;
The white-headed langur of South-west China.
INDIA, perhaps, is the only country where a non-human primate has been given divine status. Millions all over the country venerate the monkey god Hanuman. Unfortunately, this veneration does not extend to protecting the habitat of primates. Wild populations of non-human primates are in serious trouble today and survive only in small fragmented forest patches in Central and South India or in the protected areas in Northeast India. Only the red-faced Rhesus macaque and the black-faced Hanuman Langur, which have adapted to living amidst humans in urban areas, have comfortable population levels.
Out of 15 known non-human primate species found in India, nine are found in Northeast India. Among these nine, except the Rhesus macaque and Assamese macaque, the rest are exclusively found in Northeast India. But, in the last 40 years, the tropical rainforests of the Northeast have been ravaged by logging contractors feeding the a horde of timber and plywood mills. Some estimates reckon that more than half of the rainforests of the Brahmaputra Valley have been slaughtered.
Studies made by the Department of Zoology, Guwahati University, Assam, the researchers of the Indo-US Primate Project Survey (1994-99) and members of Aaranyak, an Assam-based NGO involved in conservation oriented research work on primates in the Northeast, have shown that the following primate species in the Northeast are endangered:
Golden Langur (Trachypithecus geei), a species restricted in a small pocket surrounded by the hills of Bhutan, and the Brahmaputra, Manas and Sankosh;
The Stump-tailed macaque (Macaca arctoides)
The Assamese macaque (Macaca assamensis)
The Pig-tailed Macaque (Macaca nemestrina)
The Pharyre's leaf monkey (Trachypithecus phayrie)
The Bonneted Langur (Trachypithecus pileatus)
The Hoolock Gibbon (Hylobates hoolock)
In South India, the Lion-tailed Macaque (Macaca silenus), living in the rainforests of Tamil Nadu and Kerala, is endangered. Destruction of the forests for agriculture and irrigation/hydel projects and other development has drastically reduced the wild population of lion-tailed macaques.
It is high time we started a Project Primates, on the lines of "Project Tiger", to protect and preserve our rapidly dwindling population of non-human primates.
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