Oxford Botanic Garden and Arboretum deputy director Chris Thorogood (left) and ranger Iswandi (right) of the Sumpur Kudus community forest posing with a blooming Rafflesia hasseltii flower on Nov 19, 2025 in Sijunjung regency, West Sumatra. - Handout/Courtesy of Septian Andriki
JAKARTA: The celebratory atmosphere around the rediscovery of a rare species of rafflesia parasitic plant in the past week has been eclipsed by a public relations disaster,
The rediscovery that raised concerns about lingering academic colonialism by Western institutions that often put researchers from places like Indonesia in the back seat of the scientific process.
The debacle on social media revolved around a University of Oxford post on social media, which celebrated the rediscovery of Rafflesia hasseltii, locally known as cendawan muka rimau, at the Sumpur Kudus community forest in Sijunjung regency, West Sumatra on Nov 19.
The plant was rediscovered in an expedition by Bengkulu-based conservationist Septian Andriki, Oxford Botanic Garden and Arboretum deputy director Chris Thorogood and National Research and Innovation Agency (BRIN) botanist Joko Ridho Witono.
They were guided by Sumpur Kudus forest ranger Iswandi. The expedition was part of the Community for the Conservation and Research of Rafflesia (CCRR), an international partnership made up of academic biologists, foresters, researchers and community practitioners from across the world working on rafflesia.
Among the project’s participants is University of Bengkulu botanist Agus Susatya, who did not participate in the Nov 19 expedition.
Oxford reposted footage of the rediscovery, initially uploaded by Septian and Thorogood on their respective accounts, on the university’s official social media handle, accompanied by a caption that did not mention any Indonesian researchers despite him appearing in the video.
Netizens responded to the post negatively, saying that the university was erasing the roles of local researchers in their publications.
Thorogood and Septian only found out about the backlash hours after the post was uploaded, as they were on their way back to Bengkulu and had no cell phone service along the way.
The Oxford researcher than asked the university to add Septian’s name to the post, which it did.
“Our work is collaborative and celebrates everyone involved,” Thorogood told The Jakarta Post in a video interview on Nov 26.
“So it’s absolutely right that any institution should represent this: recognising the collaborators beyond just the person from their own institution.”
“I really hope that all establishments strive to communicate in a fair and appropriate way. And I’m sure they will. We must of course celebrate the work of the local people, the beautiful flower and the endeavour we all share to protect and save rafflesia. That’s the message I hope will be taken away from this,” Thorogood added alongside photos of him with collaborating Indonesian researchers on his social media account.
In an email to the Post on Nov 25, an Oxford spokesperson said that the university was delighted to be working in collaboration with colleagues from Indonesia since 2022 to document and conserve rafflesia, with an aim to “support local conservation heroes”.
“Visiting the site of Rafflesia hasseltii was carried out in this context,” the spokesperson went on to say, “and we are very grateful to Septian […] who joined […] Thorogood in the field, and their local guide, Iswandi.”
Oxford posted another video on its social media accounts on Nov 27 highlighting and thanking the contribution of Indonesian researchers in the joint research.
While Oxford has, in many other cases, credited Global South researchers in collaborative projects, and Thorogood himself acknowledged the role of local researchers on his social media, the PR incident has refreshed the long-standing under-crediting of non-Western scientists.
“Cases of Global South researchers not being credited in collaborative work with their Global North counterparts happen frequently,” said Perdana Roswaldy, postdoctoral research fellow at the Institute for Advanced Research at Monash University Indonesia.
A man named Ali from Sarawak of present-day Malaysia, remains relatively unknown despite working as an assistant for English naturalist Alfred Russel Wallace who gathered specimens in South-East Asia between 1854 and 1862.
The criticism of Oxford about the credits was not to seek approval or portray researchers as victims, said Amrina Rosyada, a cultural anthropology PhD student at Northwestern University.
Instead, it is about holding elite academic institutions accountable to provide proper acknowledgment as awareness on unequal relations in knowledge production has increasingly grown.
“This is not just sporadic anger,” Amrina said, “but it is deeply rooted in a long history of underrepresentation and native vulnerability.”
Breaking away from the toxic cycle requires work from within, including from Indonesian researchers to be aware of and to stand up against their vulnerability in the face of unfair practices in the scientific field, said sociologist Fathun Karib from National University of Singapore’s Asia Research Institute, who is also a member of Campus Workers' Union (SPK).
“Researchers often see themselves not as workers, so they’re not aware of the division of labor, including on the global level. This is the myth that we need to debunk,” said Fathun, who also teaches at Syarif Hidayatullah Islamic State University in Jakarta.
SPK secretary-general Hariati Sinaga, who is also a lecturer at the University of Indonesia, stressed the importance of support from policymakers to build a supportive research ecosystem to make sure collaborative projects with international scientists are carried out on equal footing.
“We also need to recognize that despite our colonial past, we have our own skills and should approach the research design and execution as equal partners [of Global North researchers],” Hariati said. - The Jakarta Post/ANN
