Apes' habitat vanishing fast

More than 90 per cent of the homes of our nearest animal relatives will be destroyed within 30 years, says a report by the United Nations Environment Programme.

Less than 10 per cent of the habitat of the great apes will be left by 2030 if road building, mining and other developments continue at their present rate. The orang-utan of Southeast Asia is in even greater peril. By 2030 they will have only 424 sq km of "relatively undisturbed habitat", less than 1 per cent of the present area, the report presented to the Earth Summit in Johannesburg says.

Orang-utans and gorillas share about 97 per cent of their DNA with humans; bonobos (pygmy chimpanzees) share 98.4 per cent.

nzherald.co.nz/environment