Malaysia's Forested Areas account for 62.5 Percent of Land
12/16/98
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Title: Malaysia's Forested Areas account for 62.5 Percent of Land
Source: CNN
Status: Copyrighted, contact source to reprint
Date: 12/16/98
KUALA LUMPUR (Dec. 16) XINHUA - Malaysia's forested areas now account for
62.5 percent of the country's land size of 32.9 million hectares, Deputy
Primary Industries Minister Hishammuddin Tun Hussein said Wednesday.
Up to last year, the country had 20.56 million hectares of forested areas
including 5.82 million hectares in Peninsular Malaysia, 4.46 million
hectares in Sabah and 10.28 million hectares in Sarawak, he said.
Sustainable forest management adopted by Malaysia has ensured more
systematic exploitation, maintenance and treatment and afforestation, he
said in the Senate. He added that the government also rehabilitated
degraded areas by planting timber species to boost afforestation and
reduce the pressure on timber resources from natural forest areas.
He said other approaches adopted include gazetting of permanent forest
reserves and alienating areas for national parks and wildlife and bird
sanctuaries.