Sabah govt committed to ensure sustainable forest management, says Rahim

KOTA KINABALU: The Sabah government is committed to ensure the utilisation of Sabah's forest resources is in accordance with the principles of sustainable forest management.
Sabah Barisan Nasional (BN) Backbenchers Club chairman Datuk Seri Abdul Rahim Ismail said towards that end, the state government had also introduced various strategies to achieve good forest governance.
"We have strong policies not only on forest, but wildlife conservation, and this speaks volume of the state government's seriousness and genuine commitment on the matter," he said.
Rahim, a former forester, said implementation of the Totally Protected Areas (TPAs) in Sabah augured well for the long-term target of achieving 30% TPAs in the state.
He said this in response to an open letter issued by 16 environmental-based Non-Governmental Organisations (NGOs) for political parties to include environmental aspirations in their respective party manifesto for the 14th General Election.
"I respect their (NGOs) concern on environmental issues and I think that is fine with us (state government) since we've already taken proactive steps to ensure Sabah's natural resources are treated as a natural heritage.
"In fact, at the State Assembly Sitting on November 2016, Chief Minister Tan Sri Musa Aman stated that another 95,538.57ha were added to the network of TPAs in Sabah.
"This makes a total of 1,874,061 ha or about 26% of Sabah's surface land area. The biodiversity rich central forest (Heart of Sabah) will eventually converge, representing some one million hectares of TPAs in a contiguous conglomerate and unbroken.
"These include Ulu Segama-Malua, Kuamut, Danum Valley and buffers, Imbak Canyon and buffers and Maliau Basin and buffers," he said.
Rahim, who is also Sabah Land Development Board (SLDB) chairman, said one of the iconic examples of Sabah's forest conservation efforts was the Ulu Segama Malua - Sustainable Forest Management Project (USM-SFMP), covering 241,098 ha.
"It's a state government project and is jointly managed by the Sabah Forest Department (SFD) and Sabah Foundation for the conservation and rehabilitation of habitat for endangered wildlife,"he said.
According to Abdul Rahim, the area was logged repeatedly since the 1960's until December 2007 and in 2014, the Ulu Segama-Malua Forest Reserve was gazetted as Class 1 Protection Forest Reserve.
"The Ulu Segama-Malua Forest Reserve now boosts the largest extent of restored and rehabilitated Dipterocarp forests in the world, recovering from the ravages of uncontrolled logging, forest fires and encroachment of the past," he added.
Abdul Rahim said what was most important now was the need to enhance enforcement strategies to safeguard not only forest resources, but the wildlife.
"It's also crucial to increase public awareness on the importance of forest and sustainable management, as strong policies alone will not be able to sustain without people's participation," he said. — Bernama