KUCHING: Forest Department of Sarawak (FDS) will continue to increase enforcement operations to combat illegal logging, said Deputy Chief Minister Datuk Amar Awang Tengah Ali Hasan.
“Despite the Covid-19 pandemic, the relevant agencies have been active in conducting operations to ensure the state’s safety, and this includes FDS in its mission to protect the forests and wildlife across the state.
“FDS has also been provided an aircraft equipped with hyper-spectral imaging technology for the purpose of air monitoring and surveillance,” he told the press after launching the new FDS headquarters and website at Baitulmakmur 2 building here today.
He added that illegal logging was under control and that the public’s cooperation was important in facilitating FDS in protecting the forests and wildlife.
“We cannot have our personnel in all places at all times. That is why we need the cooperation from the community to become our eyes and ears so that we can act fast in our operations, including detection of illegal logging, detection of diseases and detection of forest fires.”
Awang Tengah also expressed his appreciation to FDS for making Sarawak the state with the largest forest cover area in the country with approximately 7.9 million hectares or 63 percent of the state’s total landmass.
He said the state government was committed to its land development policy of preserving a total of seven million hectares of land, with one million hectares as totally protected areas (TPA) and the rest as permanent forests.
Apart from that, he pointed out that FDS had expanded the areas of Heart of Borneo (HoB), a voluntary transboundary cooperation between Brunei, Indonesia and Malaysia to enable conservation and environment protection while enhancing sustainable development in Borneo.
“For Sarawak, we have already expanded the area to be managed through the HoB initiative from 2.1 million hectares to 2.7 million hectares from the southern to northern part of the state.”
Other efforts by FDS included implementation of forest plantations to prevent the timber industry from being dependent only on natural forests, and Forest Landscape Restoration (FLR) programme.
“Recently, FDS was provided with the Sarawak Aerial Detection Unit (Sadu) and an aircraft for the purpose of monitoring and management of natural resources. With that, I hope we will be able to strengthen the management in protecting our forests and wildlife.”
At the same event, FDS director Datuk Hamden Mohammad presented three National Park Management Plans to Sarawak Forestry Corporation (SFC) chief executive officer Zolkipli Mohammad Aton, witnessed by Awang Tengah.
Previously, the 100-year-old FDS used to rent several buildings around Kuching city with the final location being Wisma Sumber Alam for about 32 years.
The new website of FDS is forestry.sarawak.gov.my
Also present were Assistant Urban Development and Resources Minister Datuk Len Talif Salleh, Deputy State Secretary (Rural Transformation) Datuk Ik Pahon Joyik, and ministry permanent secretary Datuk Zaidi Mahdi.
