SABAH NOT MUCH LAND LEFT

Not much land left for plantation industry – Dompok

KOTA KINABALU Jan 10, 2012: Sabah has not much land left for the plantation industry and large scale land for the plantation industry is no longer being given away.

This was revealed by Plantation Industries and Commodities Minister Tan Sri Bernard Giluk Dompok during a press conference following the launch of the Sabah Wildlife Conservation Colloquium 2012 themed Harmonising Wildlife and Biodiversity Conservation with National Development held at the Le Meridien yesterday.

However, he said that land was still being processed for smallholders.

Meanwhile, in his speech during the launch, Dompok said palm oil continues to assume a vital role in providing part of the edible oil and fats requirements of the global population.

“With the global population of seven billion, there is an urgent need to explore alternative sources of food supply, taking into account the current constraint on available suitable land to meet the food requirements.”

He said Malaysia continued to feature as one of the largest producers in the world, providing this edible oil for a number of industries in the food and non-food sectors, including recently, supplying renewable energy from its biomass.

He added that the global palm oil industry was already well diversified with exports of palm oil reaching more than 153 countries around the globe.

“Indirectly, Malaysia plays an important role in alleviating the need for further land expansion to meet food demands in these 153 countries, especially when most countries including Germany, United Kingdom, France, India and China have little arable land left for development. Oil palm occupies less than five percent of the global oil crops planted area and less than a percent of the total agricultural land area in the world,” he said.

He added that with less land needed to produce a tonne of oil, choosing palm oil as a preferred source of oils and fats, over the other vegetable oils definitely reduces the pressure on global land use and possibly greenhouse gas emissions.

“This essentially means that Malaysia will be using a lot less land to produce edible oils in meeting the oils and fats requirements of the seven billion people in the world, while at the same time contributing towards reducing global green house emission,” he said.

Dompok also said that being one of the world’s mega-centres of biodiversity, Malaysia is constantly in the focus of the international community and the country has led the way in showcasing its efforts in wildlife conservation and environmental protection.

He said the nation is committed through numerous policies and multilateral agreements, to conserve its unique flora and fauna and that his ministry emphasises this commitments in its policies.

“The oil palm industry development is driven through the Economic Transformation Programme and the 10th Malaysia Plan (10MP) with focus on sustainable development and environmentally friendly practises,” he said.

In his speech, Dompok also stressed that this year marked the 20th anniversary of the Convention of Biological Diversity or the Earth Summit 1992.

“As party to this convention, Malaysia has pledged to maintain at least 50 percent of the country’s land mass under forest cover. Twenty years after, we are still honouring this pledge. Our uniquie wildlife and biodiversity are our natural heritage, and we owe it to ourselves not to deny our future generations these privileges and environmental treasures that we now enjoy,” he said.

He added that this demonstrates the country’s commitments on the approach towards sustainable development.

On the country’s palm oil industry, Dompok said it had become more involved in conservation efforts, giving new synergy to the term ‘Corporate Social Responsibility’.

“The Malaysian government in collaboration with the palm oil industry had launched the Malaysian Palm Oil Wildlife Conservation Fund or MPOWCF in 2006 with the objective of spearheading wildlife and environment conservation efforts in Malaysia,” he said.

He added that MPOWCF was launched with an initial funding of RM20 million of which RM10 million is a grant from the Malaysian government and the balance is provided by the palm oil industry.

The fund is administered by the Malaysian Palm Oil Council (MPOC), which has the overall responsibility to manage the various conservation projects funded through MPOWCF.

“Since the inception, MPOWCF has initiated a number of wildlife and biodiversity conservation projects and this has contributed to the establishment of the country’s first Wildlife Rescue Centre in collaboration with the Sabah Wildlife Department,” he said.

Other projects include the Jungle Patrol unit in Tangkulap-Pinangah Forest Reserve in Sabah, inventory of Sabah’s orang utan population, the orang-utan infant care centre in Bukit Merah and the satellite tracking and conservation of the Bornean banteng in Sabah.