PLANTATIONS, PEDDLERS, AND NATURE PROTECTION: THE TRANSNATIONAL ORIGINS OF INDONESIA’S ORANGUTAN CRISIS, 1910–1930

Abstract

This article examines the geographies and politics of the global trade in orangutans in the name of science and entertainment in the first half of the twentieth century, along the background of the growing international nature protection movement. In doing so, it draws attention to historical processes that led to environmental conservation in northern Sumatra. It looks at some of the causes of the wildlife trade, linking animal-human engagement in northern Sumatra in the early twentieth century to large-scale agricultural development.

During this period, wildlife traders brought shipments of orangutans from northern Sumatra to Europe and elsewhere around the world. The orangutan trade and the arrival of large numbers of apes in Europe broadly influenced material practices and decisions central to the colonial project. This included the tightening of borders and surveillance in the ports and on land, as well as the creation of wildlife protection laws and policies that regulated human relationships with the environment in colonial Indonesia.