Strong case for Lower Belum and Temengor conservation

The Star Says

PERAK is extremely proud of the fact that it had in 2003 set aside 117,500ha of forest north of the East-West Highway as the Royal Belum State Park.
However, to the dismay of conservationists, the park excluded forests south of the highway, the Lower Belum and Temengor Forest Reserves, which both remain as “production forest reserve” destined for logging.
Also left out is the 1,820m width of state land on either side of the East-West Highway.
Plans to develop this state land are many.
They range from commercial crops and vegetable agriculture to orang asli farming schemes and construction of university campuses and research centres.
Scientists say leaving the forest reserves and state land unprotected is a mistake for they are important wild habitats too.
Royal Belum is just over a quarter of the 4,343sq km that make up Taman Negara and, on its own, is not sufficient for the survival of large mammals such as the elephant, rhinoceros and tiger.
It needs to be backed up by Lower Belum and Temengor.
The Department of Wildlife and National Parks (Perhilitan) even wants the adjacent Gerik and Lepang Nenering Forest Reserves to be added to the state park.
Collectively, these will create a sprawling, contiguous wild sanctuary.
Without the adjoining forests, Royal Belum is all but an island of wilderness in a sea of logged and farmed areas.
The East-West Highway has already sliced the wild area into two and obstructed animal movements. Wildlife migrating between Belum and Temengor have ended up as road kill.
And with increased human activity comes the opening of new roads which will give poachers easy access to wild areas. More and more snares and poachers' camps are being discovered in Belum-Temengor.
In the National Physical Plan, the whole of Hulu Perak is marked as a Rank 1 Environmentally Sensitive Area (ESA), a ranking that disallows development, agriculture or logging.
This last large tract of forest in Perak is a final stronghold for wildlife.
It shelters 14 threatened mammals and an array of unique plants and animals. Internationally, Belum-Temengor is identified as a Tiger Conservation Landscape it is crucial for the long-term survival of the big cat.
The site has one of the world's greatest concentrations of hornbills 10 species are found here and the rare phenomenon of plain-pouched hornbills gathering by the thousands.
Temengor must not be seen only for its timber and land worth.
This is a mistake: the Malaysian Nature Society had a few years ago estimated that timber yields amount to only between RM58mil and RM250mil annually, whereas the other products and ecological services which the forest provides such as water supply, tourism, non-timber forest products, carbon sink, pharmaceuticals, flood control, fisheries and electricity generation are worth some RM1bil to RM1.2bil.
Keeping Belum-Temengor intact, therefore, seems to make sense.

Duo nabbed with MB's official stamp and letterhead

A senior school assistant and a contractor have been arrested with the official stamp and letterhead of the Perak Mentri Besar's office in their possession. The arrests were made pertaining to two reports of fake applications for timber concessionaire and sales of bumiputra lots between Aug 2 and Aug 11.
One of the victims had paid RM40,000 to get the bumiputra lots.
State police chief Deputy Comm Datuk Mohd Shukri Dahlan said the two suspects, aged 45 and 47, were detained separately on Sept 13 and Thursday. Twelve fake support letters were seized from them.
He said investigations revealed that the stamps were genuine and stolen from the Mentri Besar's office.
He said police were still investigating how they were stolen from the state secretariat building. He said, however, no one has lodged a report that the stamps were missing.