Brunei Aims To Show Way Wise Forest Protection
By Sobrina Rosli

Bandar Seri Begawan - With a bit of tweaking of its national forest policy, Brunei stands a chance to become "a good role model in forestry management", a government official said yesterday at the start of a series of activities to assess the sultanate's rainforest management blueprint.

"We do not have a problem with deforestation" but Brunei has to help ensure the dissemination of information on effective forest management, said Mahmud Yussof, the Acting Deputy Director of the Forestry Department.

"We want to become a good role model in forestry management," he said. An Asean assessor team is in the country to look closely into Brunei's forest policy. This is done to pilot the Asean Peer Consultation Framework (PCF) in Forestry. The country assessment mission which will conclude on Saturday kicked off yesterday at the Riverview Hotel and is hosted by the Ministry of Industry and Primary Resources.

In a welcoming speech, Dato Paduka Hamdillah Abd Wahab, the Deputy Minister of Ministry of Industry and Primary Resources, highlighted that the so-called peer consultation would give Brunei's national forestry policy, introduced in 1989, the opportunity to be assessed and upgraded.

"It is prudent to re-examine our policy, and have it assessed and evaluated through this PCF exercise and to streamline it with the current needs to support the national economic diversification agenda," said the deputy minister.

The PCF would also serve as the country's contribution to the Global Green Policy whilst meeting the growing global environmental challenges, he added. Mahmud said the exercise would be beneficial in finetuning the nation's forest policy as well as help Brunei keep in pace with the dynamic changes in forest management practices.

"We want to refine our forest policy through the PCF exercise as we want to ensure that the nation benefits from forest management," he said.

"We have our Asean colleagues where all of us are open to suggestions and ideas based on our current challenges and opportunities," he added. "We are concerned about our environment now and we need to cater to this environment protection by protecting our forest resources."

Deforestation, he said, is a global problem which contributes to the increase in global carbon emission. The assessor team is chaired by Dr Azmi Matakhir, special assistant to the Asean Secretary General and chairman of PCF. The team has representatives from Cambodia, and the Philippines, Germany and consultants from the Organisation of Economic Cooperation and Development.

Azmi said: "From my point of view, Brunei is, in terms of forestry, not spoiled compared to other countries. It's good that Brunei has this opportunity to learn from the mistakes of other countries whilst improving its policy.

"This is not only based on our assessment but also of the stakeholders in identifying and improving the factors of the national forest policy.

Dr Andreas Obser from Germany, who is the policy advisor at the Asean Secretariat, said: "Our primary objective is that we want everyone involved to learn from each other and share past mistakes and good practices so each country can learn from each other."

Nonito M Tamayo, a supervising forest management specialist at the Philippines' Forest Management Bureau, said: "We will be assessing the forest situation in Brunei, the management courses that Brunei has undergone in terms of forestry. This will not only benefit Brunei but it would also benefit us in improving forest management." -- Courtesy of The Brunei Times

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