Malaysia battles to save its national

animal from extinction

If drastic action is not taken, the Malayan tiger will be extinct within the next five to
10 years; the warning came not from a non-profit but from a Malaysian minister, Wan Junaidi
Tuanku Jaafar.

Wan Junaidi made the statement at the country's parliament on November 11, last
year.

The Malayan tiger has been declared critically endangered as its numbers have
plunged from 3,000 in the 1950s to just 500 in the early 2000s. The numbers have plummeted
to fewer than 150 as of today. Poaching has been blamed for the plummeting numbers of
tigers in the wild.

"It's definitely poaching," says Christopher Wong, head of the Tiger Conservation
Programme for the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF)-Malaysia. "Tigers are extracted
from the wild to fuel the international illegal wildlife trade. So all these the parts of the
animal, including the bones, the teeth, the skin, the penis, all can be found in traditional
medicine practices."

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Apart from poaching, loss of habitat and prey threaten the tiger's survival. /Photo shot by
CGTN's Rian Maelzer at Zoo Negara Malaysia, Kuala Lumpur, January 24, 2022.
Tigers could be extinct in Malaysia in five to 10 years. /Photo shot by CGTN's Rian
Maelzer at Zoo Negara Malaysia, Kuala Lumpur, January 24, 2022.

The Malayan tiger is classified as critically endangered. /Photo shot by CGTN's Rian
Maelzer at Zoo Negara Malaysia, Kuala Lumpur, January 24, 2022.

Poaching with snares like this is the main threat. /WWF-Malaysia

 Apart from poaching, loss of habitat and prey threaten the tiger's survival. /Photo shot by
CGTN's Rian Maelzer at Zoo Negara Malaysia, Kuala Lumpur, January 24, 2022.

Tigers could be extinct in Malaysia in five to 10 years. /Photo shot by CGTN's Rian
Maelzer at Zoo Negara Malaysia, Kuala Lumpur, January 24, 2022.

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Other major contributors are the availability of prey animals for the tiger, particularly
the sambar deer, and habitat loss and fragmentation.

WWF-Malaysia and other NGOs have teamed up and are working with the Malaysian
wildlife department in an initiative called MYCAT – the Malaysian Conservation Alliance
for Tigers.

It ensures that precious resources are used as efficiently as possible, with members sharing
research and data and dividing up territories to ensure their efforts, such as setting up camera
traps, are not duplicated, Wong says.

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Tiger sightings other than on camera traps are extremely rare. /WWF-Malaysia, Perak,
Malaysia.

Camera trap footage is key to monitoring the remaining tigers. /WWF-Malaysia, Perak,
Malaysia.

Camera trap sightings of tigers bring hope. /WWF-Malaysia, Perak, Malaysia.

 Tiger sightings other than on camera traps are extremely rare. /WWF-Malaysia, Perak,
Malaysia.

Camera trap footage is key to monitoring the remaining tigers. /WWF-Malaysia, Perak,
Malaysia.

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WWF-Malaysia employs orang asli or aboriginal people to act as rangers to patrol the forests
to look for encroachment signs and find and deactivate poachers' snares.

"They know the area very well. With their survival skills that they have, they make the best
partner when it comes to conservation of tigers," Wong says.

Smaller local NGOs such as Rimau also hire aboriginal rangers in their effort to save the
tiger.

"The situation is critical, and we only have a very, very small window to save them," says
Rimau's Lara Ariffin. "It's the responsibility of all Malaysians. People say it's the job of the
government or the Department of Wildlife to do so, but I believe that everybody needs to
participate. Even within the government itself, you have the Department of Wildlife, of
course, takes the lead, but there's the Forestry Department, there's customs and immigration,
there's the judiciary, for example. Everybody has to play a role. If not, we will lose them."
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Aboriginal communities are key to saving the tiger. /Rimau, Perak, Malaysia.

Tigers are prolific breeders, offering some hope for revival of their population. /Photo
shot by CGTN's Rian Maelzer at Zoo Negara Malaysia, Kuala Lumpur, January 24,
2022.

Malaysia has established a National Tiger Task Force. /Photo shot by CGTN's Rian
Maelzer at Zoo Negara Malaysia, Kuala Lumpur, January 24, 2022.
Male tigers roam over an area of up to 300 square kilometres. /Rimau, Royal Belum
National Park, Malaysia.

NGOs employ aboriginal rangers to patrol the forests. /Rimau, Perak, Malaysia.

Conserving large areas of contiguous forest is key, NGOs say. /Rimau, Perak, Malaysia.
 Aboriginal communities are key to saving the tiger. /Rimau, Perak, Malaysia.

Tigers are prolific breeders, offering some hope for revival of their population. /Photo
shot by CGTN's Rian Maelzer at Zoo Negara Malaysia, Kuala Lumpur, January 24,
2022.

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Lara and Wong both see some positive signs, such as the recent creation of a Wildlife Crime
Bureau and a National Tiger Taskforce, headed by the prime minister himself.

"We now have a thousand more patrollers in the jungle that we didn't have before. We have
better laws, which is fantastic," says Lara. "I think over the last two years, there has been a
vast sort of the change in momentum. I just hope we're not too late."

The covid pandemic has bought Malaysia some time. Most poachers enter Malaysia from
neighboring countries, and tighter border controls have kept them out over the past two years.
The wildlife department says there were zero cases of poaching reported last year.

There's another reason for optimism. Unlike the Sumatran rhino, which became extinct in
Malaysia two years ago after all efforts at captive breeding failed, the tiger is a prolific
species.
"Provided there's food resources, there's habitat, there's big enough are to house enough
tigers, they will breed," says Wong.

"We've seen numbers bounce back in India, Nepal," says Lara from Rimau. "So I think we
must be optimistic that with the right protection, tigers (in Malaysia) will come back, but we
must not be complacent."

Not if Malaysians want to ensure that the animal that adorns their national coat of arms will
still be roaming the forests, not just a symbol on a crest or pacing in a zoo by the time the
next lunar Year of the Tiger comes around.

(If you want to contribute and have specific expertise, please contact us at
nature@cgtn.com.)