Allocate funds to support conservation

WWF-Malaysia recommends that allocations in Budget 2018 be used to support environmental conservation to protect Malaysia's developmental gains on a long-term basis as follows:

» National security threats
Apart from being a direct threat to wildlife, poaching of wildlife is a threat to the safety of government officials and is linked to crime syndicates, illegal firearm trade, and human trafficking. Clearly, poaching is a critical threat to national security and needs to be tackled urgently.
In an innovative initiative, the federal government regularly brings together the military and the Ministry of Natural Resources to conduct joint enforcement under 1Malaysia Biodiversity Enforcement Operation Network in Peninsular Malaysia. However, in addition to existing 1MBEON operations, there is a need for specialised response units to work on continuous monitoring and patrolling as an effective measure in curbing encroachment into forests, state and national parks, and wildlife sanctuaries. This requires crucial federal budget allocations. We urge that some of the allocations that were announced to strengthen security be channelled to address this.
Allocations to enhance security measures in our marine territories should also address the issue of encroachment of foreign vessels into our seas for illegal fishing. The Department of Fisheries Malaysia has reported that Malaysia loses up to RM6 billion annually from illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing by foreign vessels; this is not only an immediate loss but also impacts our long-term fishing resources.
» Fishing capacity
Subsidies have been allocated to our fishermen in Budget 2018 to ease their costs of living. However, these subsidies could backfire in the long-term as Malaysian waters are already overfished and providing certain forms of subsidies can make this problem worse by promoting even more overfishing, leading to a depletion of fish stock. This would reduce fish catch as well as jeopardise food security and sustainable livelihoods. Subsidies for fishermen should be carefully designed with these considerations in mind and be directed towards measures that will produce greater environmental and social rewards.
» Green technology
The focus on green technology in the budget is very welcomed. In the World Expo 2017 in Astana, Kazakhstan, Malaysia underscored our natural attributes as part of our essential ability to spur green growth for the world.
We hope that green technology that works in concert with existing natural features should receive special focus. This could be through setting selection criteria that promote such focus, setting aside a sum of the allocation specifically for this, or a combination of these and other measures to spur this. Ideas like green/blue infrastructure can be used for flood mitigation for example.
WWF-Malaysia also calls for the prioritisation of green technology including processes that facilitate or propel a circular economy that converts waste to wealth and helps the transition out of current unsustainable practices. Such measures can be valuable in providing new financial streams and jobs as well as prevent the devastating impacts of increased waste generation.
Green technology can also be used to promote better conservation outcomes from improving monitoring, control and surveillance of natural resources to improving farming practices like feed conversion ratio, disease control, developing alternative fish feed and other measures.
» Beyond 2020, Agenda 2030 and the sustainable development goals and TN50
As a practical measure, we hope allocations made in Budget 2018 are assessed in terms of advancing the implementation of the Global Agenda 2030 and the SDGs in the country, which Malaysia has signed up to and see as part of the process of achieving TN50. The distribution of the allocations in Budget 2018 should be in a manner that serves at least, and ideally more than one SDG, while at the same time, not detracting from the achievement of any of the other SDGs. The assessment should be done using a holistic and comprehensive approach that applies cross cutting considerations which are also transparent. Stakeholder consultation would hence be beneficial, an effort that the government is already undertaking in several initiatives including the design of TN50.
Another long-term aspiration would be to build brand recognition for Malaysian-made products. Given our amazing endowment of natural heritage, our unique proposition to the world could be an assurance of producing biodiversity friendly goods and services, giving not only a competitive edge but also amenities like climate resilience and mitigation, and securing the wellbeing of Malaysians. Creating Brand Malaysia as biodiversity friendly is a journey that can begin strategically with the suggestions made above.
We acknowledge that some or many of these ideas may already be in the government's plans in implementing Budget 2018 but due to time constraints could not be spelt out during the speech. WWF-Malaysia is ready to assist the government meet the objectives highlighted above.
Datuk Dr Dionysius Sharma
Executive Director/CEO
WWF-Malaysia