Kutai National Park is a lowland national park located on the east coast of Borneo Island, in the East Kalimantan province of Indonesia. It is found between 10 and 50 kilometers north of the equator.

Geography

The park is located north of the Mahakam River and includes several lakes: Danau Maau, Santan, Besar, and Sirapan. It is next to the towns of Bontang and Sangatta and 120 kilometers north of the provincial capital, Samarinda. There are several traditional Bugis settlements within the national park.

The Kutai National Park covers an area of 2,000 square kilometers. It is part of the former Kutai Game Reserve, which has been protected since the 1970s. However, this status did not stop logging in a third of the forest later, and mining companies were later introduced. To prevent further deforestation, the Kutai National Park was created in 1982. Despite this, the large Borneo fires of 1982/83 damaged large parts of the forest, and people living near the eastern edge continue to reduce the actual size of the park. Today, only about 30% of the original forest remains.

Samarinda International Airport is the main way to reach the national park. There are two main areas for tourists to visit. Sangkima is on the road between Sangatta and Bontang, so it can be reached by car or bus. This area has several old buildings from the national park. There is a long walking path with elevated boardwalks that lead to one of the largest trees in the park. Because it is easy to reach and near the road, this area faces ongoing pressure from people moving into it.

Prevab is the second tourist area. It is about 25 minutes by boat up the Sangatta River from Kabo Pier, which is a boat ramp on the northern bank of the river, near the town of Sangatta. To reach this area, visitors travel by road to Kabo Pier and then take a short river trip in a ketinting, a small traditional boat used for river travel. This area is more remote, so the jungle is in better condition with less damage to the environment.

Ecology

Kutai National Park is mainly covered by a type of tropical rainforest called Dipterocarpaceae lowland forest. The park has 958 different types of plants, including 8 of the 9 worldwide groups of Dipterocarpaceae trees, 41 kinds of orchids, and 220 species of plants used for medicine. Other types of plant life in the park include coastal mangrove forests, freshwater swamp forests, and kerangas forests.

The park is home to 10 primate species, 90 mammal species, and 300 bird species. These include orangutans, Malayan sun bears, sambar deer, banteng, maroon leaf monkeys, white-fronted leaf monkeys, Miller's langurs, proboscis monkeys, Bornean gibbons, clouded leopards, black flying squirrels, marbled cats, flat-headed cats, yellow-throated martens, otter civets, and smooth-coated otters.

The number of orangutans in the park dropped from 600 in 2004 to about 60 in 2009. However, a survey in 2010 found that more than 2,000 orangutans live in the park.