Cat Tien National Park, some 150 km north of Ho Chi Minh City, covers an area of 71,000 hectares and protects one of the largest areas of lowland tropical rainforests left in Vietnam.
The park consists of three sectors: Nam Cat Tien (South Cat Tien) in Dong Nai Province, Tay Cat Tien (West Cat Tien) in Binh Phuoc Province and Cat Loc in Lam Dong Province.
It is home to a diverse range of plants and animals, including endangered species such as the Javan rhinoceros, the gaur, the wild Asian water buffalo, the white-winged duck and the silvery langur.
The latest statistics showed more than 566 cases of illegal poaching and logging centering around 462 suspects occurred in the park between January and September.
They say that people give blood, sweat and tears for their job. But at this park, the rangers actually do as they try and stop poachers and loggers from reaping the rewards of a highly lucrative trade.
Experts from the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) have repeatedly expressed their concern over the situation in Cat Tien.
In 1999, the Javan rhinocerus, one of the world’s rarest animals, was discovered in the park and put the conservation spotlight firmly on the area.
Unfortunately, these animals are under constant threat by gun-tooting poachers. Smaller animals are usually trapped by the hunters, with rangers saying they find 2,000 traps a month in the park and make 150 to 170 arrests.
All of those arrests can quickly lead to a lot of bad blood. On January 22, after being tipped off by local residents, a group of five park rangers were on the lookout for crocodile poachers in the park’s world-recognized wetlands.
Some 25 masked men stormed the compound and repeatedly stabbed the rangers, after returning back to base.
In another incident in August, an illegal logger had 20 of his knife-brandishing colleagues attack five park rangers.
After firing warning shots to no avail, the rangers eventually released the arrested logger.
The park’s deputy director, Vu Ngoc Lan, said loggers are becoming more aggressive; not content to merely attack on-duty rangers they are now increasingly singling them out for retribution.
Inside the park, rangers are also having a hard time stopping illegal logging by area residents.
According to data released by the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, Vietnam plays host to the world’s lowest rate of forest area per capita. The country has just 0.14 hectares of forest per person, a far cry from the world average of 0.97 hectares per person.
Dang Quan