Palm Oil Industry Funds Sabah Conservation to Rebuild Habitats

Malaysia’s palm oil industry is funding conservation projects across eastern Sabah to rebuild orangutan habitats and establish wildlife corridors.

Plantations across Sabah cover nearly 1.5 million hectares, dividing forests and restricting the movement of Bornean elephants and other threatened species, according to The Straits Times. Conservationists warn that isolated tree-planting efforts fail to address decades of extensive environmental damage. Restoring fragmented forest patches without connecting them to wider habitats does little to secure long-term animal survival, researchers said.

Sabah’s crude palm oil production relies heavily on both large estates and 29,918 smallholders cultivating 184,564 hectares. For endangered Bornean elephants, numbering around 1,000 individuals primarily in Sabah, moving between forests and plantations often triggers dangerous encounters with workers. While these animals cross property boundaries freely, individual plantation owners typically shoulder the management burden.

Industry funding is driven partly by commercial pressures and international supply-chain rules, including the European Union Deforestation Regulation. The Malaysian Palm Oil Green Conservation Foundation (MPOGCF) stated it has spent nearly RM10 million on forest restoration and wildlife conservation in Sabah.

A prominent 10-year project in Lower Kawag within the Ulu Segama Forest Reserve began in 2019 to restore 2,500 hectares. The initiative has planted over 250,000 trees across 275 hectares at a cost exceeding RM3 million, utilising seedlings supplied by smallholders from Kampung Tampenau.

MPOGCF reported that orangutans have returned to regenerated areas, though these sightings do not confirm an overall population recovery.

“Current restoration efforts are making an important contribution, but at the scale of forest loss, are inadequate to address the full scale of historical habitat loss and fragmentation,” said Robecca Jumin, head of conservation in Sabah for World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) Malaysia.

At Sabah Softwoods’ estate in Brumas, Tawau, a wildlife corridor connecting two forest reserves reduced elephant crop damage. Annual losses dropped from approximately RM500,000 to RM5,000 after the corridor’s establishment, according to MPOGCF figures.

The foundation is now funding research into whether planting Napier grass can keep elephants inside designated corridors rather than entering oil palm estates.

“Cameras have recorded elephants entering the feeding areas, but researchers have yet to establish conclusively whether the animals are eating the grass or whether it is altering their movement patterns,” said Hairulizam Mahmud, general manager at MPOGCF.

Habitat fragmentation also threatens Bornean clouded leopards, sun bears, proboscis monkeys, and banteng wild cattle. Experts argue that sustainability certifications should reward measurable wildlife protection rather than basic paperwork.

“Coexistence is unlikely to be sustained if conservation actions continue to impose disproportionate financial and operational burdens on individual producers,” said Nurzhafarina Othman, an elephant expert and researcher at Universiti Malaysia Sabah, in a co-authored paper.