113kg rubbish in one-hour Sukau clean-up
Published on: Saturday, March 25, 2017
Kota Kinabalu: One hour of clean-up job within a 2km radius of Borneo Rainforest Lodge Sukau swept up 113kg of rubbish from the Kinabatangan River. "The most common trash were plastic bottles, polystyrene containers, shampoo and detergent bottles, in addition to many clothes, slippers, rubber boots, tyres, metal cans and dismantled TV set and computer," said its Market Manager Nancy Lamau. "Sadly littering has been a big problem as locals dispose their wastes into the river polluting the waterways."
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Seventeen staff of the Lodge volunteered in this clean-up initiative to raise awareness among both its employees and the community on the need to keep the Kinabatangan River clean. "It is unfortunate that rubbish is visible along the river and often this can be seen by tourists who are on river cruises for a wildness experience to see sought-after wildlife like the orang-utan, elephants, proboscis monkeys, etc," she said. Stay up-to-date by following Daily Express’s Telegram channel.
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Lamau claimed that Borneo Rainforest Lodge had contributed RM581,583 out of RM2,105,720 to implement community and environmental projects and called for "concerted efforts" to mount similar programmes in future in collaboration with locals, associations and the public to keep the Kinabatangan River clean. However, Faisal Paris, a key member of the Culture , Tourism and Environment Ministry who a commissioned RM4 million two-year "Impact Study of Palm Oil Mills, Oil Palm Plantations and Other Pollutants of Selected Rivers in Sabah" between 2009 and 2011, said only a holistic river basin-wide approach executed by a River Basin Authority to the management of Sabah's major rivers to tackle the problems at source, can hope to help these rivers to rebound from chronic pollution to their original pristine state. - Kan Yaw Chong