Death of a palm oil worker last week in concession belonging to Malaysian-based company, PT Tabung Haji Indo Plantations (PT THIP, under TH Plantations Berhad) in Pelangiran subdistrict, Riau, have voiced deep concerns on massive deforestation and threats of human-wildlife conflict.

As the man-made catastrophe of forest fire and haze returns to Riau, citizens of Pelalawan have to leave their homes and be on the alert to prevent fire coming to their remaining land, while some students fainted as schools closed in the district and the province’s capital city.

Last month’s Riau forest fire catastrophe apparently comes to re-occur in this month. Meteorology Climatology and Geophysics (BMKG) of Pekanbaru recorded a significant increase on the numbers of hotspots detected in Riau Province in the last five days which reached to 230 hotspots.

National Human Rights Commission concluded temporarily that a farmer died near concession of PT Suntara Gaja Pati (SGP), a timber supplier associated to Asia Pulp & Paper (APP), in improper manner and needed further investigation.

Human and Sumatran tiger conflicts are escalating in Riau province in recent months as two endangered species were found dead by snares and a teenager laborer attacked to death by a tiger in three separate incidents.