Sarawak hits milestone with over one million mangrove trees planted along coastline

KUCHING: Sarawak has planted over one million mangrove trees and other suitable plants along its coastline, says the state’s Deputy Premier, Datuk Amar Awang Tengah Ali Hasan.

He said this was part of the state government’s commitment towards managing and conserving mangroves.

“The planting of mangroves, covering an area of about 581 hectares, was carried out with allocations from the Federal and state governments,” he said when launching the International Day for the Conservation of the Mangrove Ecosystem national celebration here on Friday (July 26).

Awang Tengah said planting mangroves was also in line with the national 100 million tree-planting campaign and the Greening Sarawak campaign from 2021 to 2025.

“Although we have reached our target, the campaign will continue.

“It should be continued at all levels of society to raise awareness on the importance of preserving forests,” he said.

Awang Tengah also said Sarawak had gazetted 12,950 hectares of mangroves as totally protected areas, while 11,084 hectares were gazetted as permanent forest estates (PFE).

In addition, he said Loagan Bunut National Park had been nominated as a new Ramsar site.

Sarawak currently has one Ramsar site, the Kuching Wetlands National Park, which was recognised in 2005.

A Ramsar site is a wetland site of international importance for conserving biological diversity under Unesco’s Ramsar Convention on Wetlands.

Awang Tengah said Sarawak has 67 totally protected areas covering 2.1mil hectares, comprising 874,523 hectares of land and 1.2mil hectares of water bodies.

He said the state also has 118 PFEs, totalling 3.96 million hectares.

“In addition, the Sarawak Forest Department is proposing 31 new PFEs estimated to cover 814,437 hectares,” he said.