Kuching - Stepping up public education, investing in more sophisticated waste treatment facilities, tightening laws and beefing up enforcement activities – these are what the Sarawak government has pledged to create a better environment for all.
State Assistant Minister for Environment Dr Abang Abdul Rauf Abang Zain said in an interview that schoolchildren had been taught to care for the environment.
Such environmental education involved the formation of “Love for the Environment” clubs in nearly 290 primary and secondary schools statewide.
The clubs teach members environmentrelated matters and provide them with handson experience in environment projects like the Reduce, Recycle and Reuse (3Rs), and school landscaping.
Teachers well-versed on environment issues lead the clubs in a crusade to produce future environment stewards.
“Competitions among schools are held every two years to judge what they have done,” said Dr Abang Rauf.
He said that environment education was extended to villages and longhouses through a community outreach programme with the help of local authorities.
The next phase of environment education, he said, would cover small and medium scale industries (SMIs) and plantation companies as more large oil palm estates were developed.
Also planned is a pilot project involving shopping complexes and supermarket chains to discourage the use of plastic bags, which are non-biodegradable.
Dr Abang Rauf said a pilot eco-sanitary project at SMK Tebekang to turn human and kitchen waste into cooking gas produced a big tank of gas a day for the boarding school.
On the on-going “Love the River” campaign, he said public education and clean-up exercises had been fruitful.
He said that river monitoring and enforcement activities would be stepped up with the ministry coordinating inter-agency joint operations.
“We must take care of water resources and make sure that effluents from plantations and industries, and human and animal wastes, do not go into the rivers,” he said.
According to Natural Resources and Environmental Board (NREB) environment quality controller Dr Penguang Manggil, none of the 47 rivers it monitored last year were classified as polluted.
This classification means that these rivers are suitable for recreational use and body contact.
On air pollution, Dr Abang Rauf said that state authorities imposed strict conditions in issuing open-burning permits to plantation companies to clear land for cultivation.
He said that Sarawak had experienced bad trans-boundary haze over the years due to open burning in neighbouring Kalimantan, Indonesia.
Dr Abang Rauf said to mitigate excessive smoke emission from the increasing number of motor vehicles, more campaigns would be organised to test vehicles on emission levels.
Department of Environment (DOE) statistics show that, during the past two years, it has inspected more than 10,000 commercial vehicles in Sarawak for smoke emissions, with 90% of them meeting the emission standards.
He said that state authorities would promote the Clean Environment Mechanism (CDM) to reduce carbon emissions, a key culprit of global warming and climate change.
CDM is an arrangement under the Kyoto Protocol of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change that allows developed and industrialised countries, which are required to reduce greenhouse gases by 5% less than their 1990 emission levels, to invest in projects that reduce emissions in developing countries.
This arrangement will assist developing countries to achieve sustainable development through the sale of certified emission reduction (or carbon credit) to developed and industrialised countries.
Dr Abang Rauf said, as an incentive, one could claim between US$12 and US$15 (RM30 to RM49) by reducing greenhouse gas emissions by one metric tonne.
Of the 27 CDM projects in Malaysia, only one is in Sarawak – landfill gas at the Golden Hope composting project in Bintulu Division.
On the disposal of solid and toxic wastes, he said the state operated the country‘s most modern sanitary landfill in Mambong, Padawan, near here.
The RM40mil project is equipped with an incinerator capable of treating toxic and clinical waste. All the solid and scheduled wastes in the state capital are sent to the Mambong landfill.
Dr Abang Rauf said that Sibu and Miri had less advanced sanitary landfills while other towns relied on environment-unfriendly open dumpsites to dispose their solid wastes.
“As it will cost between RM15mil and RM20mil to construct a sanitary landfill (similar to that in Sibu and Miri), our next plan is to get several local authorities to share a landfill.
“We are setting up a landfill information system to gather the data.”
Dr Abang Rauf said a central pig farming area equipped with state-of-the-art facilities was being developed in Pasir Puteh, about 72km from here.
The state and federal governments have allocated over RM70mil for the project, which covers 800ha.
“We want to relocate all pig farms in environment-sensitive and water-catchment areas to the site,” he added.
Seventy-two or 95% of the licensed pig farms in Kuching and Samarahan Divisions have agreed to relocate to the project, which will begin next year.
The project will have parent breeding and production farms, feed mills, meat processing factories, bio-security facilities, environmentfriendly waste treatment systems and administration and residential complexes for management staff and other workers.
Dr Abang Rauf said that Sarawak planned to implement a statewide sewage system, and the details would be announced soon.
On the tightening of environment laws, he said the proposed Natural Resources and Environment (Audit) Rules 2008 was awaiting the state cabinet‘s approval.
He said the rules were to ensure more effective management of environment pollution caused by projects like aluminium smelters,coal-fired power stations and other heavy industries.
The proposed audit rules will make the project proponents and their consultants more accountable.
If NREB was not satisfied with the environmental monitoring and auditing of a project by its consultant, it could appoint a third party to carry out an independent audit, with the costs being borne by the project proponent.
Dr Abang Rauf said that Sarawak had put in place various environmental laws, like the Natural Resources and Environment Ordinance, 1993, and its subsidiary legislations, and what needed to be done was more effective enforcement of the laws.
“We need to step up environment education. People have to take care of the environment and become stewards to tackle climate change.”
He said that polluters had to be punished and pay for their misdeeds.
Dr Abang Rauf said, as a developing state, Sarawak had to strike a balance in development and environment conservation.
Source: http://thestar.com.my (June 10, 2008)
