Nik Nazmi: Forest reserve equal to 400 Titiwangsa parks illegally stripped

KUALA LUMPUR, Nov 19 — Malaysia’s Permanent Forest Reserves (PFR) have suffered illegal encroachment on 38,376 hectares of land, or over 400 times the size of Titiwangsa Lake Gardens.

According to Natural Resources and Environmental Sustainability Minister Nik Nazmi Nik Ahmad, the encroachment persisted despite such activities being punishable by fines and imprisonment under the National Forestry Act.

“As of December 31, 2023, approximately 38,376.78 hectares across 1,074 locations in Peninsular Malaysia’s PFRs have been illegally encroached for activities such as agriculture (cultivation of oil palm, bananas, rubber, durians, and vegetables), mining, settlements, construction of buildings and jetties, aquaculture, cemeteries, recreational areas, food stalls, and religious structures,” he said in a written parliamentary reply.

To combat illegal encroachment, the minister said monitoring systems like satellite imagery and remote sensing technologies were being employed across different states.

He cited Sarawak’s uses of Continuous Monitoring of Surveillance (COMOS) and Sabah’s iForSabah system in collaboration with the Malaysian Space Agency as examples.

The federal government has also allocated RM100 million for restoration efforts, replanting 731,176 trees across 1,235 hectares of degraded forest land, he added in his response to Datuk Seri Shahidan Kassim (PN-Arau).

Shahidan had asked the minister to state the extent on encroachment into PFRs and steps taken to address this.