
Malaysia reaffirms commitment to conserve tiger population.
KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysia has reaffirmed its commitment to protecting and conserving the population of tigers in the recently concluded Tiger Summit held in St. Petersburg, Russia.
Natural Resources and Environment Ministry, in a statement here Friday, said that during the summit, its minister, Datuk Seri Douglas Uggah Embas had pointed out the need for bold and affirmative actions to enable the doubling of wild tiger population by 2022 at the global level in a move to prevent the extinction of the endangered species.
“It is important for leaders to take bold and affirmative decisions and actions through the Global Tiger Recovery Programme (GTRP) to save the wild tiger and to double their numbers by 2022,” the statement said.
Malaysia adopted the National Tiger Conservation Plan (NTCAP) last year with a primary objective to have 1,000 wild tigers by 2020 and outlined 80 action plans to achieve the objective.
“Malaysia has also taken various complementary actions to support the growth of the wild tiger population. Since last year a moratorium has been imposed on the hunting of certain tiger prey species throughout Malaysia,” it said.
Under the 10th Malaysian Plan, the government had approved a specific research project on monitoring of tigers in a move to monitor the implementation of the NTCAP and to look at the progress of real tiger numbers in the wild.
“Thus, with a new specific data, the project will assist to ensure the objective of the NTCAP to have up to 1,000 wild tigers by 2020 is achieved,” it said.
In order to implement the NTCAP, substantial resources in terms of funds, human capital and technology is crucially needed.
“Realising the huge cost in conserving tigers and their habitats, Malaysia fully supports the proposed Wildlife Premium Market+REDD mechanism where developed countries can play a more committed and effective role in conserving the world’s tigers.
“All these efforts should be reinforced and supported by a strong international cooperation to combat transboundary illegal wildlife trade,” it said.
According to the World Wildlife Fund and other experts, there are only 3,200 tigers left in the wild now, compared to an estimated 100,000 a century ago.
-bernama-