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etirement home: Orangutans on display at the Jogja Orangutan Center in Kulonprogo, Yogyakarta, on Friday. The center is building a dome to house orangutans that are not able to return to the wild due to old age, disability or sickness.

YOGYAKARTA: The Jogja Orangutan Center (JOC) in Kulonprogo regency says its building a huge dome to house orangutans unable to return to the wild.

The dome would measure 120 meters in diameter — approximately the size of two soccer fields, the JOC said in a release.

The JOC held a ceremony on Friday to lay the foundation of the dome.

“The primary goal of the center is to create a facility that will be more enriching, stimulating and fulfilling for orangutans than any site in existence today,” according to the release on the center’s website.

The dome would be able accommodate up to five groups of orangutans that would be able to roam about the dome. The middle of the structure would host a giant artificial tree with a core of concrete and steel and a “skin” of enhanced drip-fed fig cuttings.

The new facility, in combination with the JOC’s existing 14-hectare quarantine and education center, will be managed in cooperation with the Royal Family of Yogyakarta.

The JOC, founded by the Yogyakarta Natural Conservation Foundation, has been building two introduction domes that will accommodate about 12 orangutans each. — JP