Sabah to Review Unfavourable Timber Pacts with Private Sector
Copyright 2001 BERNAMA (Malaysian National News Agency) Malaysia General News
December 30, 2001, Sunday
KOTA KINABALU, Dec 30, 2001 - After terminating several lopsided agreements involving local government authorities here, the Sabah government has now turned its attention to unfavourable agreements between the state government and private organisations under the Forest Management Unit (FMU) programme.
Chief Minister Datuk Chong Kah Kiat said that based on the guidelines of the Forest Management Plan, only five or six of the 17 concessionaires, including those under Yayasan Sabah and Lembaga Tabung Haji areas, were eligible to invest in plantations and had complied with stipulated requirements.
"Those who are serious I believe they can still make a go at it but subject to a number of modications..the rest we are looking into it. This is a very interesting matter that we are going to address next year," he told reporters after flagging off the annual Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) charity run at Padang Merdeka here today. Chong, who is LDP president, was asked to comment on the viability of the FMU agreement under the state government's sustainable forest management programme.
In 1997, the state government allocated 2.7 million hectares of logged-over of class II (commercial) forest reserve under 27 packages of 100,000 hectares each for reforestation over 100 years.
The FMUs would result in aggressive reforestation, massive injection of funds in forest activities, conservation through prudent management of forest areas and upgrading of manpower trainning programmes.
However, the FMU prohibits logging within water catchment areas, 30-metres along the banks of rivers, forest community settlement and other aspects that could pose detrimental effects to the environment as well as the people in general.
Asked on the likely modifications to be introduced to ensure the success of the FMU, Chong said; "They should be encouraged to have certain area of these (under FMU) to develop some economic crops particularly rubber.
"If they plant rubber then the gestation period will not be that long...if they plant tree it takes them to 12 or 20 years to get the returns," he said.
Asked whether the whole idea of FMU was good, Chong said people were bound to be suspicious of the allocation of large hectares of land for that purpose.
"What is the idea of giving these people (private companies) 100,000 hectares for reforestation...that alone will give you a suspicion. Why not give them 20,000 or 50,000 hectares, why give them 100,000 hectares," he said.
Chong said he had instructed Minister in the Chief Minister's Department Datuk Abdul Ghapur Salleh to look into the matter.
"We view this matter seriously and in fact, he (Ghapur) has already started meeting up with the companies concerned," he said.
On allegations of illegal logging activities in the forest reserve areas, Chong said it was true.
"It is not an allegation it is a fact, it is true but then we just cannot nab them.
"I got videos and I got photos showing these areas where the activities were in action this is where we have to address it," he said.
Chong said the government was invistigating the matter and hoped that the culprits would be nabbed soon.
"There were instances when we nabbed just the small fries or operators..we have consficated some of these equipment but as far as the illegal logging is concerned we wish to nab those really behind it," he said.