Regrowing Kinabatangan's Rainforest Corridors for Orangutans

Founded in 1998 by two field biologists in the village of Sukau, HUTAN is now a team of more than a hundred staff, almost all drawn from the local Orang Sungai community of Sabah's Kinabatangan floodplain. Since 2008 the group has planted upwards of 246,000 native trees across 11 reforestation sites, reconnecting isolated forest fragments into corridors that let orangutans, elephants and other wildlife move safely again. HUTAN also runs one of the world's longest-running wild orangutan research programmes, trains Honorary Wildlife Wardens to reduce human-wildlife conflict, and works with palm oil growers on wildlife-friendly plantation management. The group was a finalist for the 2022 Earthshot Prize for its landscape-scale restoration model.