Once nearly extinct, rare Raffles’ banded langur now thrives in S’pore

A Raffles' banded langur and her baby. The population of the species in Singapore is likely to more than double in the next 15 years, thanks to conservation efforts. - ANDIE ANG

SINGAPORE (The Straits Times/Asia News Network): The rare Raffles’ banded langur is slowly bouncing back from the brink of extinction and its numbers are likely to double from 75 to more than 150 in the next 15 years, said experts.

The shy tree-dwelling monkey - found only in Singapore and southern peninsular Malaysia - was in the 1990s predicted to die out within 40 years due to habitat loss and fragmentation, said Mandai Nature and Oxford Brookes University in a joint statement on Tuesday (Oct 10).