Daily Express Subscriber
Sign in to your account.

ENGAGE the public, train a coalition of the willing to Google Earth. Everyone can monitor the forest at will, through simple, easy-touse Google techniques.

In a move to transform forest monitoring in the country, Transparency International (TI) Malaysia has successfully developed a user-friendly Forest Watch website, said Project Manager, Victor Soosai.

They think the easy process, which enables every Tom, Dick and Harry to see what is going on in the wilderness, may prove the best bet to safeguard the remaining forest resources, Sabah included.

Tl Malaysia President, Dato' Dr Baharuddin bin Hj Ghazali, who is also Vice President of the Institute of Foresters Malaysia (Irim), said the effort is meant for the good of all.

"We are launching the website on Feb 1 (in KL) but our day-long seminar and training session on Jan 19 (at le Meridien Hotel) actually gave Sabah folks an early peep into what it's all about," said Victor Soosai, Manager of TI Malaysia's Forest Governance Integrity Programme (FGI) Project.

"At last, we have come up with a very user-friendly website, not tedious to work on, which makes it easy and simple to do monitoring," Soosai explained.

"We have improved upon the first training we did in Sabah in mid 2011," he said.

"That time, we trained people to go into Google Earth and then find the co-ordinates to get things done," Soosai said.

"Now, our Forest Watch website administrator can capture the latest images in Google Earth once people key in a place," Soosai said.

"The website creates the avenue for the public where they can actually scan, go into a particular place, pin-point an area, take the pointer at a particular image that appears, place it wherever they want it and it will calculate the co-ordinates immediately," Soosai explained the major difference.

"Basically, our system bypasses Google Earth even though it is supported by Google Earth so it makes reporting and monitoring very easy," Soosai asserted.

How easy? In an instant?

"Yes, because people just have to log in," he said.

"Once you have logged in already, you report whatever they want to do and then see which is the image you want to capture and put into their report and that image is already captured and put on your archive already and that image will go forward with you, " Soosai said.

The surprise - good archive of images on Sabah

Google Earth is not without its limits.

A common complaint is images are many years outdated.

So how real is real time?

"It depends," he said.

"If it is an active area , then you find more images in the area and it can be quite current also," Soosai asserted.

How recent is recent?

"Some even two months or three months," he said.

Sabah included?

"Sabah also, you'll be surprised that Sabah has got a good archive of pictures - very good images," Soosai claimed.

Meaning one or two-month old images?

"Some active areas where a lot of people with concerns and who wanted update , they buy the images , so Google Earth takes the images for them. "

Does that mean if people look at Sabah, they can get a fairly good picture of what happened last month?

"Yes, easily, I think , in certain areas they can ," Soosai asserted.

"Since we are looking at engaging the public, we have streamlined how the reporting is done, make sure people understand how to use it, not only by making it very user-friendly but we also want to make it as up-to-date as possible so that when the reports come out, they'll be genuine reports," Soosai said.

Essentially, it is a quest for reality, the facts, the truth.

"Once people key in a place, the administrator at this Forest Watch website will grab the latest image and they can see those particular image.

Then they can put in that particular image, they can search whatever particular area they want, put the pointer there and it calculates the coordinates for them. This becomes very user-friendly, hassle-free, makes monitoring simple," Soosai repeated.

However, the most important thing is collaboration between the agencies, said Soosai, who didn't name them.

Reality of corruption in forestry sinks in

Speakers this years include deputy Director of the Malaysian Anti Corruption Commission, Sabah, Dr Ganason Periathamby, Professor Dr Phua, an expert in remote sensing of change and biomass, Universiti Malaysia Sabah, Adam Murphy of Global Diversity Foundation and Gordon John Thomas of Pacos..

Dr Phua said advanced precision remote sensing technology has made it possible to detect changes in forestry with great accuracy and details.

So, if Sabah is keen to figure out how to get into ' integrated river basin management' to restore the damages and safeguard what remains of its natural resources on a long term basis, here is a ready expertise to look at the State realistically and holistically.

Dr Ganason, a veteran prosecutor of many corruption cases, painted a vivid reality of corruption in forestry.

He cited one case in Pahang where a very "junior officer" in the Forestry Department virtually acted like a 'taigor' in directing a team of lumberjacks in illegal logging , mentioning interestingly how the 'taigor' instructed collaborators in forestry crime to start swinging the axe only after 4pm, that is, after office hour!

A Q&A speaker cited the surprise sighting of a 'District Forestry Officer' from a well known State, seen in the close company of timber tycoons in a well known casino in a foreign country a few hours of flight time from Sabah.

So, those stories from the horse's mouth brought home how real corruption in forestry was across the country and those who were meant to safeguard the natural forest resources actually became co-conspirators in destroying it.