Considering worries about nature condition in Indonesia, Indonesian prominent rock music group, Slank, jointly with EcoNusa released musical video covering Seleksi Alam (Nature Selection) song. The musical video was released in commemoration of Earth Day on April 22, 2021, as the momentum for climate crisis campaign.
Bimbim, Slank drummer, said that Seleksi Alam is reflected from human deeds who do not care about nature. The song lyric obviously tells that nature has echoed ‘its voice’, but human has never listened to it. You hear too much // you never listen // all signs rebuffed.
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“Seleksi Alam tells about people warning to those who are seeing but not observing. The signs of nature selection pass through our face but we do not realize. May the song here makes us reflect that nature destruction is caused by human,” said Bimo ‘Bimbim’ Setiawan Almachzumi during the virtual launching of Clip Video of Seleksi Alam on Thursday, April 22, 2021.
According to Abdee Negara, Slank guitarist, each of their albums themes are about social and environmental conditions. The commitment has become the starting point for Slank to make their works from the initial album entitled Suit…, Suit… He… He… up through to the 24th album, Vaksin. On this basis, Slank gave positive response to EcoNusa Foundation for collaborative Defending Paradise campaign.
Defending Paradise campaign is showed through the video clips and simple sentences on the current condition of Indonesian forests. The landscape of primary forests in Tanah Papua and Maluku Island including the beauty of cenderawasih bird covering the 3 minutes 15 seconds footage. Forests are no longer green and have been changed into palm oil estate with visual contrast of the habitat of million creatures.
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“The message we want to convey might have been several times. The future of the world lies in the forested countries. If we fail to safeguard it from now, our future will be miserable, including our future generation,” said Abdee.
EcoNusa CEO Bustar Maitar said that Defending Paradise is deemed a collaborative campaign with Cornell Lab of Ornithology. Since 2004, Edwin Scholes, an ornithologist from Cornell University, and Tim Laman, the photographer and biologist, have documented 39 species of Paradisaeidae for eight years.
As to Bustar, cenderawasih is the symbol of well-maintained conservation. Forests in Maluku Island and Tanah Papua contributed nearly half of forested areas in Indonesia. The areas have the highest biodiversity in the world, beating Madagascar.
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But the beauty of cenderawasih and tropical rainforests in Tanah Papua and Maluku Island in which the birds live will get more threats. In 1990 up to 2019, forests in Tanah Papua declined almost 2 million hectares as from the total of 33 million hectares. Meanwhile, in Maluku Island, deforestation from 2009 to 2018 has eliminated 151,942.14 hectares of forests. The high rate of deforestation in both areas is deemed the last frontiers to Indonesia that speeds up the global warming.
“If we safeguard the nature, the nature will secure us. If we fail to safeguard the nature, natural selection has waited for us. Happy Earth Day, defending paradise!” said Bustar.
Editor: Leo Wahyudi & V. Arnila Wulandani
