Kota Kinabalu: Chief Minister Datuk Seri Hajiji Haji Noor has asked European Union (EU) Ambassador to Malaysia, Michalis Rochas to correct misconceptions about the country’s oil palm industry after having personally seen for himself the sustainable and best practice carried out by Sabah’s oil palm sector.
Hajiji said Sabah has all this while been promoting sustainable practice in oil palm cultivation contrary to what the EU anti-palm oil lobbies have been spreading negatively and widely.
Meeting with Rochas and his delegation at Sri Gaya, Tuesday, he welcomed the ambassador’s commitment to highlighting Sabah’s development priority in agriculture, industrial and tourism as well as the energy sector to the EU.
Hajiji appreciated that Sabah’s total trade with the EU was about RM4.2 billion (RM3.3 billion in export and RM800 million in imports).
“EU is an important trading partner. We want to see more investments and increased trade with the EU,” he said.
Hajiji said the State Government is keen to forge greater partnership with the EU to tackle environmental issues and welcomed the EU’s offer of support and expertise in this area.
He said Sabah has done much to meet the national commitment of maintaining 50 per cent under forest cover and ensuring 52 per cent of the state’s forest as permanent forest reserves, parks and wildlife conservation areas.
WWF-Malaysia Conservation Director Dr Henry Chan briefed the Chief Minister that Sabah’s sustainable palm oil can be globally recognised by fostering stakeholder institutions to collaborate in attaining common goals; enhancing institutional arrangement to facilitate the management of cross-cutting issues and adopting the living landscape approach to overcome deforestation and biodiversity loss.
Blu Hope founder/CEO Simon Christopher briefed Hajiji on its efforts to make Sabah a plastic neutral state through different recycling technologies that give monetary value to plastic wastes.
Also in the delegation were First Counsellor, Delegation of the EU to Malaysia, Francesco Floris, Blu Hope Marketing/PR Director Michelle de la Harpe, Senior Advisor, Business Finland, Mohamed Farid, Country Head - Singapore, Malaysia & Indonesia Clewat Ltd, Henri Mikael Vaitti, Chief Operating Officer, River recycle Oy, Nuutinen, Stop Fish Bombing Malaysia Director, Terence Lim and Stop Fish Bombing Malaysia Director UN, Sylvia Pius.
State Secretary Datuk Seri Sr Safar Untong, State Attorney General Datuk Nor Asiah Mohd Yusof and Sawit Kinabalu Group Managing Director Datuk Bacho Jansie were also present.
