Leading The Green Economy Champions

YB Dr. Xavier Jayakumar, Minister of Water, Land and Natural Resources takes the reins in ensuring environmental preservation will be the vanguard of Malaysia’s green economy growth.

Enhancing Environmental Sustainability through Green Growth” has been identified as one of the six key policy pillars at the 11th Malaysia Plan mid-term review. With green economy identified as a Key Economic Growth Activity (KEGA) under the Shared Prosperity Vision 2030 (SPV2030), the preservation of the country’s natural assets and resources is now more important than ever. As the Minister of Water, Land and Natural Resources, YB Dr Xavier is regarded as a champion of the green economy, with his Ministry being the main entity responsible for the management of the country’s water, land and natural resources. International Business Review had the privilege of interviewing him to find out how KATS is supporting the national agenda to drive green growth.

Dr Xavier Jayakumar

The Ministry of Water, Land and Natural Resources (KATS) has taken comprehensive measures to ensure that the country’s economic development does not jeopardise the preservation of its natural resources. While focusing on economic growth and development, Malaysia has worked hard to ensure that economic development and environmental conservation go hand in hand.

The Ministry is committed to ensure that Malaysia’s forest is managed according to Sustainable Forest Management (SFM) principles in line with the country’s commitment to maintain at least 50 percent of the country’s land area with forest and tree cover. The Ministry continues to engage closely with the State Governments through various platforms especially in the conservation and rehabilitation of our forest area.

The Ministry’s key initiatives

To support the national agenda to drive green growth, specifically on “environmental preservation and rehabilitation”, the ministry has taken up various initiatives to ensure the resilience of our biodiversity and ecosystems such as the Central Forest Spine (CFS) Project, Mangrove Tree Planting Programme, Heart of Borneo Initiative, and the Save our Malayan Tiger Campaign. The most recent programme that we will be launching is the 100 Million Tree Planting Campaign which involves various ministries and government agencies, state governments, private sector, non-governmental organisations, private sector and the public in general.

These initiatives are carried out by the departments under this ministry which have their specific roles. We have the Forestry Department Peninsular Malaysia (FDPM) which manages our forest based on SFM principles, the Forest Research Institute of Malaysia (FRIM) which are implementing and planning research for the development of the forestry sector and conservation of forest resources as well as the Department of Wildlife and National Park (DWNP) spearheading wildlife conservation
and protection.

Water Conservation a primary charge

KATS is also committed to the conservation of water for present and future generations. Our obligation under Aichi Biodiversity Targets requires at least 17% of terrestrial and inland water areas as well as at least 10% of coastal and marine areas is to be gazetted as protected areas. At present, only 3.4% of our coastal and marine areas that has been gazetted as protected areas. One of our efforts is to work together with various state agencies to restore the increasingly degraded terrestrial, inland waters, coastal and marine areas as well as to protect other existing catchment areas
by minimising threats.

KATS through the National Hydraulic Research Institute of Malaysia (NAHRIM) is embarking in various researches related to catchment management specifically developing standards and Integrated Lake Basin Management Plan to protect our inland waters such as reservoirs, lakes and ponds. KATS through the Department of Irrigation and Drainage and NAHRIM also participated in the development Integrated River Basin Management (IRBM) studies. Such studies are in line with our commitment to achieve sustainable development goals to protect and restore water-related ecosystems, including mountains, forests, wetlands, rivers, aquifers and lakes as well as the need to ensure the conservation, restoration and sustainable use of terrestrial and inland freshwater ecosystems and their services.

Preservation of Malaysia’s tropical forests is vital for the nation’s sustainable economic development.

Ecotourism – The Game Changer for our Forests

Malaysia is recognised as one of the 12 megadiverse countries in the world and blessed with vast reaches of natural ecosystems. The tropical rainforests of Malaysia constitute the core of biodiversity in Malaysia. They represent our unique natural heritage which has evolved over 130 million years, resulting in very rich flora and fauna.

In Malaysia’s context, forests play a vital role in empowering people, protecting ecosystems and promoting sustainable economic development. Malaysia, with its outstanding biodiversity and scenic natural environment has been successfully promoted as an eco-tourism destination in recent years. With this natural heritage interlinked with our rich cultural diversity, Malaysia believes that ecotourism is one of the sectors that has enormous potential. These destinations benefit the surrounding local people through job opportunities such as nature guiding, home stay operators and food and beverages operators.

Malaysia’s forest has been and will continue to be of major national economic importance. However, there is now greater emphasis on sustainable forest management so that the forest resources will be sustained for future generations. Besides timber, there are many other non-timber forest products such as rattan, gaharu, gums, resins, edible oils, medicines and food items which are collected both for domestic use and trade.

Sustainability of forests strongly relates to the quality of water for the people. Forested catchments supply a high proportion of the water for domestic, agricultural, industrial and ecological needs in both upstream and downstream areas. A key challenge faced by land, forest and water managers is to maximize the wide range of multi-sectoral forest benefits without detriment to water resources and ecosystem function. To address this challenge, there is an urgent need for a better understanding of the interactions between forests/trees and water, for awareness raising and capacity building in forest hydrology, and for embedding this knowledge and the research findings in policies.

Coastal land is a valuable resource that has important economic, social, cultural and ecological values. However, several impacts of sea level rise are already being experienced by the coastal communities of Malaysia mostly due to coastal erosion and coastal flooding. The outputs from the SLR projections would be used to improve the vulnerability and adaptation assessments in various sectoral such as coastal, marine resources, infrastructure, biodiversity etc. Similarly, there is a need to develop institutional mechanisms to enhance synergies in dealing with issues related to forests and water as well as to implement and enforce action programmes at the national and regional levels.

Protecting Our Natural Resources

KATS is currently working together with the Royal Malaysian Police (PDRM) in “Operasi Bersepadu Khazanah (OBK)” which was launched in September 2019. The joint collaboration is one of KATS’ initiatives to protect Malaysia’s treasured flora and fauna by combating forest and wildlife crimes.
The ministry has conducted 7 series of OBK since 2019 and among our success includes (i) apprehending 82 poachers, (ii) confiscating 460 snares as well as illegal harvested items amounting to RM 2.7 million worth.

Apart from that, KATS is constantly cooperating with other Ministries such as the Ministry of Home Affairs (MOHA), Ministry of Energy, Science, Technology, Environment and Climate Change (MESTECC), State Governments and the public in efforts to curb environmental crime. The Ministry through Forestry Department Peninsular Malaysia (FDPM) have also been utilizing the latest technology such as satellite imagery and drones for forest enforcement activities. The Ministry also maintains a close relationship with the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) to monitor complaints, abuse of power and corruption in the forestry sector.

There are more than 34 Acts related to the environmental matters and various regulations, rules and orders passed for the purpose of environmental protection. However, the enforcement of the laws usually has been hampered by the lack of enforcement officers. The relevant agencies have insufficient officers to carry out activities to combat the perpetrators of these crimes against natural resources. With the advent of technology, we are now able to incorporate the use of techs in our enforcement activities. This allows for the some aspects of enforcement to be automated, rather than relying solely on manual approach.

In the coming 12th Malaysian Plan, government is also focussing more on the development of land/forest/water management emergence technology to develop smart digital system, data sharing and business model such as smart metering, smart sensors, network communications, Big Data, IoT, and Hybrid Infrastructures, quasi-real time data analysis, forecasting, event diagnosis and visualisation technologies for advanced decision support.

Public – Private Partnerships

Our roles at the Ministry are mainly focused on the preservation and conservation efforts on natural resources. In the effort to reduce emissions from forest activities, the Ministry is currently developing a framework for public-private partnership under the REDDPlus mechanism such as Forest Conservation Certificate (FCC) and Domestic Transferable Mitigation Outcome (DTMO).

There are also other incentives offered by other Ministries/Agencies for corporates to align themselves with the green agenda such as Green Investment Tax Allowances (GITA) and Green Income Tax Exemption (GITE) under Malaysian Investment Development Authority (MIDA). Budget 2020 has also extended the GITA and GITE incentives until 2023.

Apart from that, various incentives are identified in the Green Technology Masterplan (2017 – 2030) for water and wastewater. For instance, to encourage the installation of Rainwater Harvesting Systems (RWHS) to all types of buildings, houses and premises of residences and industrial, some additional incentives have been provided through:

Creating a new, green world from a brown one is a collective effort – from the ground up and also top down. But as with all collective efforts, there has to be a constant drive leading the charge, and it’s good to know that the Ministry of Water, Land and Natural Resources has
our back.

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