KUCHING: The Sarawak Forest Department (SFD) has rubbished claims by RimbaWatch that Sarawak will lose more forest area based on a study made by Global Forest Watch.
SFD director Datuk Hamden Mohammad said the projection by RimbaWatch was based on the perception of trends on the opening of land areas for development.
“We do not deny that Sarawak is rapidly progressing towards a developed state by 2030. Indeed, there are areas of land that have been opened up for the purpose of development in various sectors such as agriculture, urban development and housing, industry and so forth.
“However, Sarawak strives to balance this development with environmental sustainability, especially in maintaining its forest areas,” he said in a statement yesterday.
Based on Sarawak Land Use Policy 2012, he said, it has been set that seven million hectares (ha) for the purpose of forestry land use which is a Permanent Forest Reserve (six million ha), and for the purpose of Fully Protected Areas (one million ha).
“The Auditor General’s Report 2021 Series 2 titled Special Audit of Forest Management and Environmental Impact, Activities of Ministries/Agencies and Compliance Audits of Ministries/State Agencies, issued on January 6, concluded that forests in the state of Sarawak have been sustainably managed to provide socio-economic benefits and maintain the environmental sustainability.
“This report confirms that the forested area is 7.65 million ha, which is 61.4 percent of the total area of Sarawak,” he said.
Hamden added that environmental sustainability is the main agenda in the Post-COVID-19 Development Strategy 2030 (PCDS 2030) toward a developed Sarawak.
“Meanwhile, there are many measures that have been set to conserve and rehabilitate degraded forest areas in the state,” he said.
Among the programmes carried out to ensure forest conservation and rehabilitation efforts include large-scale tree planting programmes throughout Sarawak, through the Greening Sarawak Campaign and the Malaysian Greening Campaign (MGC).
“Under the MGC, Sarawak is committed to planting 35 million trees during the 12th Malaysia Plan (2021-2025).
“From 2021 until now, Sarawak has successfully planted 21,091,996 forest trees. Various planting campaigns and programmes have also been carried out vigorously with the cooperation of all parties,” he said.
Besides that, he said, is to reduce the rate of deforestation by using low-impact logging (RIL – Reduce Impact Logging) methods, and for this reason, the Forest Management Certification (FMC) is mandatory for all long-term license areas (Long-Term Forest Timber License).
“So far, a total of 18 Forest Management Units (FMUs) with an area of 1,476,244 ha have successfully obtained FMC while a total of six Forest Farm Management Units (FPMUs) with an area of 94,966 ha of FPMU have obtained FMC by Malaysian Timber Certification Council (MTCC) which is recognised by the Programme for the
Endorsement of Forest Certification (PEFC) based in Geneva,” he said.
He added logging licensees have also been required to carry out enrichment planting by growing trees in their respective concession areas at an appropriate rate to replace the trees that have been cut down.
“Moreover, it is to reduce the dependence of Sarawak’s income from timber sources to new economic sources such as carbon trading.
“Many efforts have been carried out towards the realisation of this carbon trading initiative. This will indirectly keep the forest areas from being explored. The Forests (Forest Carbon Activity) Rules, 2022 were drafted and approved by the State Legislative Assembly in 2022, and a carbon study permit was issued to operators of carbon license areas,” he said.
Hamden said forest and geospatial technology was being used in forest management and conservation.
“Advanced technology has been widely used to ensure that forest areas in Sarawak are carefully and systematically monitored.
“This has helped forest enforcement to be implemented more effectively and efficiently,” he said.
He added that Continuous Monitoring and Surveillance (COMOS) method has been used in Sarawak to combat illegal logging and detect forest faults with the help of sophisticated DA42-MPP aircraft technology.
“In addition, this advanced technology is also used for forest restoration programmes, especially in remote and hard-to-reach areas, for example the method of spreading tree seeds using seed balls and drones (SARABOM project),” he said.
Based on all the efforts that have been implemented, he said, Sarawak will be able to maintain forest cover and environmental sustainability for the wellbeing of the people.
“This was confirmed by the Auditor General’s Report 2021 issued on January 6,” said Hamden.
