Malaysian Tropical Forest

Issued in 1992

Tropical rainforests are an ancient but fast depleting natural wonder. The tropical rainforests have often being described as a “natural supermarket” as all of our every day’s basic essentials can be obtained from the forests such as food, drinks, fruits, medicine, etc.

At one time, tropical rainforest extent across the equator like a green belt but today, tropical rainforests cover less than 6% of the Earth's land area. The rainforests can only be found on three of the world's seven continents in the following geographical areas:

Central America - In the Amazon River basin.


Africa - Zaire basin, with a small area in West Africa and also in eastern Madagascar.


Indo-Malaysia - Borneo, Southeast Asia, West Coast of India, Assam, New Guinea and Queensland, Australia.

The present surface area of the rainforests may be quite small compared to most of the other biomes, but it still plays an important role in the world around us. Tropical rainforests produce 40% of Earth's oxygen and more than half of all the world’s plant and animal species can be found here, where hundreds of species are being discovered daily as scientists explore the dense growth that is home to millions of organisms.

Given the biodiversity of the plant species, many of the medications that are used today have been created through the combination of the exotic vegetation. In fact, about a quarter of all medication today is produced using resources from the rainforest.

Borneo is one of the last places in the world where you can still find magnificent tropical rainforests. The forests of northwest and north Borneo have some of the highest levels of biodiversity in the world. Borneo is also the centre of evolution and radiation of many endemic species of plants and animals.

The remaining pristine tropical rainforests of Borneo is the only natural habitat for the endangered Orangutan and primates such as the Proboscis monkeys, which are endemic to Borneo and Tarsier. It is also an important refuge for many endemic forest species, and the Asian Elephant, the Sumatran Rhinoceros and the Bornean Clouded Leopard.

There are roughly around 15,000 species of flowering plants with 3,000 species of trees (267 species are dipterocarps), 221 species of terrestrial mammals and 420 species of resident birds, which include eight species of hornbills, in Borneo (source: MacKinnon K, Hatta G, Halim H, Mangalik A. The ecology of Kalimantan. Oxford University Press, London. 1998). Borneo’s forest also provides a vast array of plant species - as many as 5,000 species.