Sumatran Elephant in North Sumatra-Aceh Corridor Found Dead, Suspected of Poisoning

MEDAN, KOMPAS – A wild Sumatran elephant was found dead in a palm oil plantation near Gunung Leuser National Park, Langkat Regency, North Sumatra. The death of the male elephant represents a significant ecological loss amidst the declining population in the North Sumatra-Aceh corridor. The conflict between elephants and the community in the buffer zones of the national park continues to recur.

"We continue to strive for monitoring the remaining elephant population in the North Sumatra-Aceh corridor. Negative interactions between wildlife and the community in that area are very high," said the Head of the North Sumatra Natural Resources Conservation Agency (BBKSDA), Novita Kusumawardhani, Monday (7/4/2025).

The death of the Sumatran elephant (Elephas maximus sumatrae) was discovered after the North Sumatra BBKSDA received a report about the discovery of a dead wild elephant in an oil palm plantation in Bukit Selamat Village, Besitang District, Langkat. The North Sumatra BBKSDA together with the Gunung Leuser National Park (TNGL) Center, a team of veterinarians, and local police visited the location, Saturday (5/4/2025).

The carcass of the wild elephant was found in a palm plantation managed by the community and adjacent to a plantation owned by PT Rapala. The plantation directly borders TNGL.

The team is also investigating the possibility that the elephant was poisoned. Veterinarians have taken samples of the elephant's organs and stomach contents for toxin testing in the laboratory. Currently, the samples are still in the process of being sent to the laboratory, and the results can be known in a few weeks.

Novita stated that the conflict between wildlife and humans in the surrounding area is very high. They continue to mitigate negative interactions between wildlife and humans. "We urge the community and companies holding land use rights or concessions within the roaming areas of elephants around TNGL to support efforts to mitigate this conflict," said Novita.

Head of Conservation Section of BBKSDA Region III Stabat Bobby Novandry said that the male Sumatran elephant is very important amidst the endangered wild elephant population in the North Sumatra-Aceh corridor. It is estimated that there are only three groups of elephants left in the corridor. Male elephants usually live solitarily and will mate with female elephants across groups.

One of the biggest challenges of Sumatran elephant conservation in the North Sumatra-Aceh corridor is the very high conflict with the community. "Moreover, some of their homreng or roaming areas have now been turned into oil palm plantations," said Bobby.

In fact, elephants will always circle through the same roaming areas to find their food even though the forest cover has changed into oil palm plantations. Conflicts occur because people think elephants enter their gardens and damage crops.

Prior to the elephant's death, a conflict between animals and humans occurred on Saturday (3/22/2025). A farmer in Mekar Makmur Village was attacked by an elephant and was injured. The village is close to the village where the elephant was found dead.

When the conflict occurred, several wild elephants crossed the village. The elephants remained around the village for several days. Officers from the North Sumatra BBKSDA together with the community then chased the elephants away so that they would enter the TNGL.

In Kompas' records, the deaths of two female elephants also occurred in the area in Bukit Mas Village in April 2022. The first elephant was an adult female found about 150 meters from the TNGL boundary.

The elephant is thought to have died from blood loss after being stabbed with a blunt object in the chest and stomach. The elephant's left caling (the name for the female's tusk) was missing. There were incision marks on the muscles that connected the caling. Meanwhile, the right caling was intact.

Meanwhile, the second elephant was a juvenile female elephant. However, the elephant could not be necropsied because only bones remained. The elephant is believed to have died six months earlier.