Daihatsu, stop funding Kurma Asih

Kurma Asih is one of many groups in Bali that refer to themselves as sea
turtle conservationists, but I found them doing things that I would refer to as a
“sea turtle diminishing program”. Instead of letting the sea turtle
hatchlings go to their freedom in the sea directly after they hatched,
these “conservationists” rather put the poor things in
filthy shallow tanks, or even colourful wee buckets in such a high
density that they pretty much live in a pile.

Why would they put these hatchlings in captivity? Because
they would like to sell them to foreign tourists. They don't actually
call it “selling sea turtle babies,” but what would you call it if you
encountered a group of fake conservationists that offered to let you set sea turtle
babies free, but then after you finish setting the turtles free, they lead
you to a big book where you can see signatures and amounts of money the
visitors have given? Even with the huge amounts of money they receive, you
can still see the hatchlings are dying and decaying inside
those filthy buckets without anything that civilized people would call
medical treatment. Where does the money go?

Kurma Asih asks village people along the Jembrana Regency shore to compete
to hunt for as many sea turtle nests as they can find, and sell the eggs to Kurma Asih. They pay 1.000 Indonesian Rupiah or as much as 10 cents (per turtle?). Yet this activity causes a bad situation in which the sea turtle mothers ready
to lay their eggs are rather frightened back to the ocean. During the
low season I could walk on the beach for hours without encountering
anyone. It is dark, quiet and lonely as cemetery. But if you
stand there during the peak nesting season May to July, then you feel
like you are on a highway. Motorbikes with strong lights come and go,
searching for any chance to find sea turtle tracks. Instead of
searching for nests in a “sea turtle friendly” method by walking and using red
lights,etc., they tend to compete for finding the eggs by using
bikes. It's very sad.

Whenever they find a sea turtle mother nesting, these villagers will
immediately approach her, then put a plastic bag inside her egg pit and
let the mother drop the eggs directly into the plastic bag. When the
mother is ready to cover her pit with sand, they just grab her rear flipper and toss her aside! They did that in front of me
and the Kurma Asih guy! I tried to tell them that that was wrong, totally
wrong, but they didn't seem to care, and I didn't get any
help from the Kurma Asih guy. I guess he didn't have the guts.

When ProFauna investigated the situation, we noticed that these people
have a problem with sea turtle eggs hatching, since they just put the eggs
in a plastic bag then drape it over their motorbike. They'll take any shortcut without caring how rough the road is. Can you
imagine how those eggs bounce around? The best egg relocating method
is to put them in a bucket and
carry it very gently, especially when they transport it by
automobile.

To make a long story short, we can prove that Kurma Asih doesn't do
the job of a professional sea turtle conservation group. I rather see
this is as much more of a lucrative family business than a conservationist
effort. Tourists come along, representing governments and companies, and give their
money to Kurma Asih, joining in the “conspiracy” to reduce the number of one of the
endangered species in Indonesia - the sea turtle. We at ProFauna are trying the best we
can to persuade Kurma Asih not to keep capturing sea turtle hatchlings, and we ask them to stop buying eggs from villagers, because
it is against Indonesian regulations. But instead they just keep ignoring us.

We sent a letter to the chief of Jembrana Regency on September
19th 2013 asking the local government not to help Kurma Asih with
money, as Kurma Asih always just spends the money to buy more eggs, hatch
the eggs, and keep the babies in very bad conditions while they wait for months for the tourists to arrive. Many of them die during this time, and
those who survive face the certain danger of death because
they become reliant on humans for their food, etc. The young turtles that survive and are released
tend to approach any boat or person because they are accustomed to being fed
by people. I even hear fishermen talk about a surefire method for getting a big catch: by using sea turtle hatchlings as a bait!

Daihatsu is a giant wealthy automobile company that helps Kurma Asih
financially. We still don't have any idea if Daihatsu knows that Kurma Asih
treats sea turtle babies so poorly. It is very hard to contact Daihatsu. A while back ProFauna tried by email and a letter to contact their office in Jakarta. When we didn't hear back from them, we asked our supporters in all of
Indonesia to bombard Daihatsu with protest letters. Finally, they responded to us by email on October 22nd 2013
saying that they were going to ask Kurma Asih about this.

We think that is not quite enough, and rather strange that Daihatsu
is going to check out Kurma Asih by themselves without
inviting ProFauna as an official investigator. We need more people to send
more letters and emails to the Daihatsu company. It is much better if
somebody outside of ProFauna who knows about the dangers of sea turtle
"headstarting" could convince Daihatsu to persuade Kurma Asih to
stop keeping the hatchlings in captivity and to stop buying eggs from
the villagers. The real conservationists never raise sea turtles or do any kind of commerce with its eggs.

With this we would like to ask you to please join us and ProFauna Indonesia's supporters along with Daihatsu consumers to send protest
letters to the Daihatsu company. Let us together ask Daihatsu to stop helping Kurma Asih financially and to stop the sea
turtle egg trade and stop sea turtle headstarting at Kurma Asih.

Below is the contact information for PT. Astra Daihatsu Motor:

hotline@daihatsu.astra.co.id

Jl. Gaya Motor III No. 5 Sunter II,
Jakarta 14330
Telp: (021) 6510300/400/500
Fax: (021) 6510606

Many Thanks and Best Regards,

Bayu Sandi
ProFauna Campaign Officer