Borneo Island

Borneo or Kalimantan always has a special place in the imagination of the West. Brooding, fecund, teeming with strange creatures and unimaginable huge wilderness. Those are the exotic treasures of this majestic island.

Borneo or Kalimantan is a land to explore. It covers an area about 747.000 sq km, five times the area of England and Wales. Some areas are highland and other is flat or low land which is flowed by tremendous rivers; the Kapuas, the Kayan, the Mahakam, the Barito, and others. The land covered by one of the world’s largest stretches of tropical rainforest and inhabited by the Dayak and the Malay tribes, known as indigenous people of the land.

The name of the island is Borneo or Kalimantan, English calls Borneo to describe the northern view of the island, it comes from Malay “Buah Niyor”, means Coconut. It is about 197.000 sq km, holds the East Malaysian state of Sarawak, home of the former kingdom of James Brooke, the famous “White Raja”, Sabah state where the great Mount Kinibalu stands, and the Independent Islamic Sultanate of Brunei Darussalam, which is one of the world’s highest per-capita income also gets share the small part of this island.

Kalimantan used by Indonesian and Dutch to describe the two-thirds of the huge island on southern, comes from Indonesian, “Kali & Intan”, means, River of Diamond, an apt description of the abundant resources of the land.

Although the region just 5 percents of the population, its 549.032 sq km represent 28 percents of the land mass on the nation, divided into four provinces; West Kalimantan, East Kalimantan, Central Kalimantan, and South Kalimantan.