It is the forest wildlife reserve known as Karang Gading, established in the Dutch colonial era. Located between Karang Gading and Selotong villages, the reserve is protected and managed by Langkat North-East II Resort of Nature Resources Conservation (KSDA).

The reserve occupies 9,520 hectares of an estimated 35,000 hectares of coastal area in Langkat regency. Mangrove forests take up about 70 percent of the reserve, while a pine-tree forest occupies the remaining coastal area. The reserve is home to a variety of mammals, reptiles and fish, and is rich with shellfish, mangrove crabs, shrimp and fish. Animals predominantly found here include monkeys, particularly black or gray long-tailed monkeys, as well as boars, otters, monitor lizards, snakes, white egrets, herons, hawks and seagulls.

However, the reserve is now on the brink of extinction.

Since 1960, businessmen posing as locals have vied with one another to take control of the area. Illegal clearing of mangroves to build shrimp ponds has increased steadily over the past decade. Today an estimated 2,000 hectares of the reserve has been turned into shrimp ponds managed either traditionally or intensively.

According to field reports, most of these ponds are owned by people hailing from Stabat, Binjai and Medan.

A visit by The Jakarta Post in late March to the area around Slingkar island in Secanggang, which previously was covered in mangroves, found barely any.

"The mangrove forest here has been turned into shrimp ponds," confirmed Ismail, a Secanggang resident.

Locals denuded the island's mangrove forest due to strong demand for wood to make charcoal, he said. New settlers and others have also flocked there to clear the mangrove forests and build shrimp ponds.

Slingkar, an area of about 1,000 hectares, is now almost completely bare, the once-beautiful mangroves ripped out to create a vast expanse of shrimp ponds. Heavy machinery is usually used to completely uproot the trees. As a result, marine organisms that once lived beneath the roots of the mangroves have died out. The dense mangrove forest that served as a fortress against waves and high tides has gone.

Local residents have long complained about the mangroves' destruction and the wider damage it will cause. Marine life in Karang Gading reserve has already been reduced, and the local people, most of whom are fishermen, now have to sail farther away for their catch.

Sea water already frequently inundates the area, especially at high tide. Fishermen fear that unless the environmental damage is managed quickly, Secanggang will become like Tapak Kuda, which was massively inundated by the sea some time ago.

Rembo, a local youth, said rising sea water flooded the market area of Selotong village on at least one occasion.

Locals have tried to fight the complete disappearance of the forest animal reserve to the businessmen. Jandri, who once worked for KSDA, said the center warned people a number of times but to no avail.

For example, a letter was sent to Secanggang officials instructing that the reserve must not, under any circumstances, be sold or managed in the interest of individuals or groups.

"A field inspection shows that in areas with SM 15 up to SM 19 boundaries, the protected forest area of this animal reserve has been illegally cleared," Jandri said. This had violated Law No. 5/1990 and Government Regulation No. 28/1985.

It may be concluded, then, that certain government officials are likely responsible for what could be the extinction of the mangrove forest in Karang Gading Nature Reserve. Supporting this conclusion is the claim by a shrimp-pond owner, Kim Hok, also known as Junaidi, that he had no idea the land for his ponds, covering a total of 34 hectares, was part of the reserve. "We have an official transaction deed for these shrimp ponds from the subdistrict head," he said.

Court action

A staff member of North Sumatra KSDA, L.M. Naibaho, confirmed that illegal clearing of mangrove forests inside Karang Gading reserve had occurred since 1960, starting with land cleared by local rice farmers.

In the 1980s the reserve's sustainability came under threat as shrimp ponds were established on a massive scale, with locals selling their land to make way for extensive illegal clearing.

In 1995, large companies and wealthy individuals established a number of oil-palm plantations in the reserve area, increasing the damage. Naibaho said a 1999 inventory carried out by KSDA North Sumatra I Medan showed that the total area of the reserve damaged because of illegal clearing stood at 3,932 hectares.

A KSDA team who performed a field inspection on Feb. 14, 2001, found that a further 650 hectares of the animal reserve area had been cleared illegally. An area of some 150 hectares has been turned into intensive shrimp ponds while the remaining 500 hectares was being cleared. Naibaho said that during this inspection the team had detained Kim Hok, known as the chairman of the intensive shrimp-pond owners.

KSDA I Medan identified 42 people involved in illegal clearing at the reserve, Naibaho said. Some acted under the name of limited liability companies or partnership firms. Some had been taken to court, including Tengku Rahman, who was sentenced to four months' jail with a probationary period of eight months.

Naibaho said the KSDA involved was unhappy that most action against alleged illegal land clearers had been processed only up to the police level, and gave the case of Kok Huang as an example.

In mid-2000 the local KSDA allegedly caught him clearing land. He was taken to the police, who reportedly later set him free.

Naibaho said very few of those involved in illegal clearing had been brought to court. The outcome of many cases was unclear, such as that of PT Eka Sindo, which was handled by the provincial prosecutor's office of North Sumatra a year ago.

Naibaho said KSDA had teamed up with the Langkat regional administration to erect boundary poles and notices prohibiting forest clearing within the reserve. The prohibition was based on Law No. 41/1999, with punishment of up to 15 years in jail or a maximum fine of Rp 5 billion.

Activists from non-government environmental organizations, who have protested against the tardiness of local officials in stopping illegal clearing, welcomed the latest steps to safeguard the reserve.