SARAWAK has the potential to become the main player in international carbon trading with its current policy to decrease the rate of deforestation and logging activities.
Minister of Natural Resources and Urban Development Datuk Amar Awang Tengah Ali Hasan said that with the current state policy of forest conservation and reservation, deforestation and conservation efforts have improved.
He said this is to ensure that the agenda of environmental sustainability can be attained.
“Hence, the state needs to find new potentials to generate income from the natural resources value such as carbon trading,” he said in his winding-up speech in the State Legislative Assembly today.
“The state government has started carbon initiatives based on the Nature Based Solution approach.
“Through the amendment of the Forests Ordinance 2022 and the Forests (Forest Carbon Activity) Rules 2022, both of which have been enforced since Jan 1 this year, the state now can implement its carbon trading initiative,” he said.
With the extensive forest coverage, Awang Tengah also noted that Sarawak has the potential to become a player in international carbon trading.
He said a study on carbon has been presented by a local company to evaluate areas of potentials to run carbon activities.
Other than that, the government through the Forestry Department Sarawak has improved the Sarawak Log Tracking and Forest Revenue System (REVLOG) with a new module known as Forest Licensee Portal enforced on April 1 this year.
“The government through the Forestry Department Sarawak aims to ensure improve and develop a forest administration system in line with advanced technologies and digital information.
“REVLOG is an online application used by the department to manage forest and monitor logging activities until post-logging activities,” Awang Tengah said.
The application is also used to track logs along the logging supply chain and for forest revenue collection.
