River Care

“One key sector for action is to stop conversion of forests and peatlands. There are significant opportunities for Malaysia to reduce emissions from peatlands through better management of oil palm and agriculture on peat as well as the development of peatland restoration projects,” Global Environment Centre director Faizal Parish said.

Awards were given to eight organisations – three educational institutions and five community based ones for work on sustainable river care and support for sustainable river basin management.

The National River Care Fund (NRCF) is paying tribute to Malaysia’s most deserving river care champions through the River Care Award 2021.

Global Environment Centre river care programme manager Dr Kalithasan Kailasam said setting up an authority for a specific river basin was a good way moving forward. “Setting up such an authority is actually a holistic way forward for sustainable river management, especially when it involves a shared river.”

Kalithasan said a one-stop agency on rivers must be led by the federal government but comprise state governments, which have a valid economic reason to want to exploit resources that could affect water catchment areas.

THE Covid-19 pandemic and movement control order (MCO) have made people realise the importance of nature’s resources and the need to care for it for our health and well-being, says Faizal Parish. “People realised its importance when they were forced to stay home and didn’t have access they normally would to fresh food, ” said…

“Among the activities or initiatives they have conducted are river stretch adoption programme, establishing community garden, conducting zero-waste awareness programme and more. Since its commencement in 2016, these river care initiatives under the ROLPOP5 has outreached to a large number of participation.”