SARAWAK – The National Land Council has set 155,000 hectares of forest allowed to be cut annually under the Tenth Malaysia Plan (10MP), in contrast to 170,000 hectares in the previous Plan period. Natural Resources and Environment Minister, Datuk Seri Douglas Uggah, said the annual allowable cut (AAC) was set at that to ensure proper and effective forestry management planning.
“This is to balance timber yields with the forest size in line with the concept of sustainable forest management and optimum timber production,” he said, after launching the RM3 million Centre of Excellence for Orang Utan Conversation in the Batang Ai National Park, Nanga Delok.
Uggah said that up to 2008, Sarawak had six million hectares of forest reserve, out of 14.43 million hectares in the whole country, with logging activities concentrated only in the production forests. Logging in the protected forests was not allowed. Sarawak has a forest area of 8.23 million hectares or 66.9 per cent of the state’s land area compared to 4.4 million hectares (56.7 per cent) in Sabah and 5.85 million hectares (44.7 per cent) in the peninsula.
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