Malaysia's Ekran Logged 1,000 ha of Bakun Forest
11/11/98
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Title: Malaysia's Ekran Logged 1,000 ha of Bakun Forest
Source: Reuters
Status: Copyrighted, contact source to reprint
Date: 11/11/98
KUALA LUMPUR, Nov 11 (Reuters) - Malaysia's Ekran Bhd has logged about
1,000 hectares (2,500 acres) of forest and taken out 79,000 cubic metres
(2.8 million cubic feet) of timber from the proposed Bakun dam project,
the state assembly of eastern Sarawak state was told.
The Star newspaper on Wednesday quoted Sarawak's Assistant Minister for
Finance and Public Utilities, Michael Manyin Jawong, as telling the house
that Ekran was the recipient of the proceeds from the timber sales.
Ekran, the dam project's developer, paid the state 10.84 million ringgit
($2.9 million) in timber premiums, he said.
The Bakun hydroelectric project was expected to submerge more than 500
square kilometres (187.5 square miles), or an area of lush rainforests the
size of Singapore, but has been mired in controversy because of questions
over its environmental impact and economic efficiency.
The project, situated in Sarawak on Malaysia's side of Borneo island, was
shelved by the Malaysian government due to the economic crisis.
The decision was taken as part of a broader strategy to rein in large
scale projects that threatened to overheat the economy and to curb the
imports of expensive capital goods.
The government has since taken away the project from Ekran and is reviving
parts of the project, which was originally planned to have a capacity of
2,400 megawatts and would have served the whole of Peninsular Malaysia.
It has told Ekran that the firm would be compensated.
The federal government recently offered to pay Bakun Hydroelectric
Corporation, the project's main coordinator in which Ekran has a 32
percent stake, 811 million ringgit to take over its assets and
liabilities, Jawong said.
He said more than half of this money was intended to compensate Ekran for
the expenses it had incurred in the management and implementation of the
project.
($1-3.8 Malaysian ringgit)
Copyright 1998 Reuters Limited.