Impact of oil palm plantation on mammal and herpetofauna species diversity

Abstract

Since 2008, Indonesia has succeeded in becoming the largest palm oil producer in the world. However, this success has drawn some accusations that oil palm plantations come causing deforestation and decreasing biodiversity. The research has been carried out in the topic of "the origin of the status and type of land cover and variations in the wildlife species diversity in oil palm plantations” in Province of Riau, South Sumatra, Central Kalimantan and West Kalimantan. The results of the interpretation of Landsat imagery coverage of 1 year before being oil palm plantation and interviews with resource persons showed that the type of land cover of the 8 study locations was 5 in the form of secondary forest, 2 bushes and the rest in the form of rubber plantations. The status of the land as a whole APL or customary land. Furthermore, the results of the comparison of the number and composition of species of mammals and herpetofauna before and after being oil palm plantations show that the impact of oil palm plantations on these two variables of diversity species according to the origin of land cover types. For the origin of the type of land cover in the form of shrubs or rubber plantations, the impact of oil palm plantations is positive because it increases the number of species both mammals and herpetofauna (except the number of species of herpetofauna on KJNP estate plantations). As for the origin of the type of land cover in the form of secondary forest, the existence of oil palm plantations increase the number of mamalia in 2 locations and herpetofauna in 4 locations The presence of oil palm plantations is thought to have caused changes in the composition of species with a range of 50 to 100% for mammals and 23 to 76% for herpetofauna.