Lone Drøscher Nielsen (born 1964) is a Danish wildlife conservationist who established the Nyaru Menteng

Orangutan Orangutans are great apes native to the rainforests of Indonesia and Malaysia. They are now found only in parts of Borneo and Sumatra, but during the Pleistocene they ranged throughout Southeast Asia and South China. Classified in the genus ...

Reintroduction Project in

Kalimantan Kalimantan (; ) is the Indonesian portion of the island of Borneo. It constitutes 73% of the island's area, and consists of the provinces of Central Kalimantan, East Kalimantan, North Kalimantan, South Kalimantan, and West Kalimantan. The non-Ind ...

Borneo Borneo () is the List of islands by area, third-largest island in the world, with an area of , and population of 23,053,723 (2020 national censuses). Situated at the geographic centre of Maritime Southeast Asia, it is one of the Greater Sunda ...

Indonesia Indonesia, officially the Republic of Indonesia, is a country in Southeast Asia and Oceania, between the Indian Ocean, Indian and Pacific Ocean, Pacific oceans. Comprising over List of islands of Indonesia, 17,000 islands, including Sumatra, ...

in 1998.

Early life and work

She was born and grew up in Aabybro,

Denmark Denmark is a Nordic countries, Nordic country in Northern Europe. It is the metropole and most populous constituent of the Kingdom of Denmark,, . also known as the Danish Realm, a constitutionally unitary state that includes the Autonomous a ...

. She encountered her first

orangutan Orangutans are great apes native to the rainforests of Indonesia and Malaysia. They are now found only in parts of Borneo and Sumatra, but during the Pleistocene they ranged throughout Southeast Asia and South China. Classified in the genus ...

while volunteering as a fourteen-year-old at Aalborg Zoo. Later, when she was working as a flight attendant for

Scandinavian Airlines The Scandinavian Airlines System (SAS), commonly known as Scandinavian Airlines, is the national airline of Denmark, Norway, and Sweden. It is part of SAS Group and is headquartered in Solna, Sweden. Including its subsidiaries SAS Link and ...

, she volunteered for a month-long project on the

n island of

, and here she came into contact with orangutans again. From 1996 until 2010, Drøscher Nielsen lived in Borneo to help save the

Bornean orangutan The Bornean orangutan (''Pongo pygmaeus'') is an orangutan species endemic to the island of Borneo. It belongs to the only genus of great apes native to Asia and is the largest of the three ''Pongo'' species. It has a coarse, reddish coat and up ...

from

extinction Extinction is the termination of an organism by the death of its Endling, last member. A taxon may become Functional extinction, functionally extinct before the death of its last member if it loses the capacity to Reproduction, reproduce and ...

due to loss of its natural habitat due to logging and

oil palm ''Elaeis'' () is a genus of palms, called oil palms, containing two species, native to Africa and the Americas. They are used in commercial agriculture in the production of palm oil. Description Mature palms are single-stemmed, and can gro ...

plantations.

Nyaru Menteng

Drøscher Nielsen sought the advice of Dr Willie Smits of the Borneo Orangutan Survival (BOS) Foundation about the possibility of creating a new project in Central Kalimantan to deal with the swelling numbers of orphaned orangutans. Smits agreed to help, and with the financial backing of the Gibbon Foundation and BOS Indonesia, Lone founded the Nyaru Menteng Orangutan Reintroduction Project in 1998. She was able to build the facility under an agreement with the Indonesian Ministry of Forestry, and Nyaru Menteng officially opened its doors to the first dozen orangutans in 1999. The sanctuary was designed to hold up to 100 orphaned orangutans while they go through rehabilitation. In addition to quarantine cages, medical clinic, and nursery, the sanctuary had a large area of forest in which orangutans could learn the skills needed to live in the wild. Nyaru Menteng quickly became the largest primate rescue project in the world, with over 600 orphaned and displaced orangutans in its care in 2009 and a staff of 200. Many of these orangutans are only weeks old when they arrive, and all of them are psychologically traumatized. The sanctuary not only saves the mostly orphaned baby orangutans from the local farmers and illegal pet-traders, but has developed a process for their gradual re-introduction to the remaining Borneo

rainforest Rainforests are forests characterized by a closed and continuous tree Canopy (biology), canopy, moisture-dependent vegetation, the presence of epiphytes and lianas and the absence of wildfire. Rainforests can be generally classified as tropi ...

. Babies and young orangutans brought to the centre are cared for 24 hours a day by a team of "babysitters". As they grow and learn they are then taken to "forest school" where they learn, still with staff present, to climb trees and survive in the forest. At the age of about eight years, they are relocated in groups of around 25 to a neighbouring island for the first stage in their release. Drøscher Nielsen lived near the Nyaru Menteng Rescue Center,

, Borneo, managing a specialized clinic of veterinarians and paramedics as well as a workforce of local Indonesians who work as babysitters caring for the orphaned orangutans in the center. In 2010 she was forced to leave Borneo and returned to Europe due to a life-threatening illness. She worked as a Senior Expert Advisor at the international organisation Save the Orangutan from her base in Wales. In July 2018, Drøscher Nielsen released a statement in response to comments made about her conduct by her former employer, Save the Orangutan, explaining her move to the Orangutan Land Trust.

Television and film

Nyaru Menteng has been featured on

Animal Planet Animal Planet (stylized in all lowercase since 2018) is an American multinational pay television channel focusing on the animal kingdom owned by the Warner Bros. Discovery Networks unit of Warner Bros. Discovery. First established on June 1 ...

's award-winning series ''

Orangutan Island ''Orangutan Island'' is an American documentary film, documentary television series, in the style of the earlier series ''Meerkat Manor'', that blends more traditional documentary filming with Dramatic programming, dramatic narration. The series ...

'', the

BBC The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) is a British public service broadcaster headquartered at Broadcasting House in London, England. Originally established in 1922 as the British Broadcasting Company, it evolved into its current sta ...

's '' Orangutan diary'', '' Saving Planet Earth'' and ''Growing Up... Orangutan'' (BBC/

Discovery Channel Discovery Channel, known as The Discovery Channel from 1985 to 1995, and often referred to as simply Discovery, is an American cable channel that is best known for its ongoing reality television shows and promotion of pseudoscience. It init ...

). Drøscher Nielsen starred in the 2008 Australian documentary-drama, '' The Burning Season''.

Writing

In 2006 Drøscher Nielsen published ''From Forest Kindergarten to Freedom'' with Pia Lykke Bertelsen in English, German and Danish. The book is a photographic story that follows two baby orangutans, Emma and Emil, growing up in the rehabilitation centre and eventually being released into the wild, with photos by Humphrey Watchman, Steve Leonard, Sam Gracey, Lone Drøscher Nielsen and Danielle Brandt.

References

External links

Meet Lone at Orangutan OutreachVideo of Lone Drøscher Nielsen's presentation at Qi GLOBAL 2009
{{DEFAULTSORT:Droscher Nielsen, Lone 1964 births Living people Keepers of animal sanctuaries Nature conservation in Indonesia Danish conservationists Danish women environmentalists Danish activists Danish women activists Orangutan conservation People from Central Kalimantan People from Jammerbugt Municipality Danish emigrants to Indonesia