Signing of MoU between Mongabay Indonesia – UNILA

Today, Thursday (27/9), the University of Lampung (UNILA) and Mongabay Indonesia inaugurated the collaboration between the two parties by signing a Memorandum of Understanding. This event also scheduled the launch of the badak.id website, and the Workshop with topic “Pentingnya Media Sosial dan Foto Jurnalisme untuk Penyelamatan Badak Sumatera”.

The event was held in the Ruang Sidang, 2nd floor of the Rectorate Building, UNILA and was attended by 150 invitations and participants i.e. UNILA Board of Management, Director of Mongabay Indonesia, Head of the Forestry Service Lampung Province, Head of the Balai Bukit Barisan Selatan, Head of the Taman Nasioanal Way Kambas, Head of the Balai Konservasi dan Sumber Daya Alam (BKSDA) for Bengkulu-Lampung, Executive Director of the Yayasan Badak Indonesia (YABI), Aliansi Jurnalis Independen (AJI), and lecturers and students from universities in Lampung.

In his speech, Director of Mongabay Indonesia, Dr. Rizki Rinanto Sigit, M.M. said that the population of rhinos in the world is only around 100. One of them is in Lampung. This figure is a number that is less and you could say the population is almost extinct. Therefore, with this collaboration, he hopes that UNILA can help preserve rhinos through many academic programs.

Rector of UNILA, Prof. Dr. Ir. Hasriadi Mat Akin, M.P., who gave a speech also said that one of the causes of the extinction of rhinos is because they are solitaire and their fertile times are rare. This makes it difficult for rhinos to breed. “UNILA welcomes this collaboration with pleasure because it is in accordance with the objectives of UNILA in the context of improving research and internationalization.” said Rector. This activity is also in accordance with the Tri Dharma of UNILA where all the academicians should give contributions to the community and society. “Hopefully, lecturers and students in UNILA can contribute to publishing international journals about rhinos,” added him. He also hopes that UNILA can find other ways that rhinos can breed and the moment of Andatu birth’s in TNWK can happen again”.

The launch of the Badak.id website is also an effort to preserve rhinos, where the academicians of UNILA can share the results of their research on the website. In addition, through this workshop agenda, it is expected that can provide new information and understanding for academics to find out about rhinoceros conservation through social media and journalism.
The event continued with a workshop Pentingnya Media Sosial dan Foto Jurnalisme untuk Penyelamatan Badak Sumatera presented by Mongabay Indonesia, namely, Dr. Rizki Rinanto Sigit, M.M. as Director of Mongabay Indonesia, Akhyari Hananto as a Social Media Coordinator, and Rahmadi as an Editor.