Shuttleworth Foundation » Malaysia

National Consultation in Sabah on Women’s Rights in ASEAN

Holly — Sun, 16 Jun 2013 11:48:00 +0000

From 14-15 June, Holly Shrumm (Natural Justice) attended a national consultation in Kinarut with women from East Malaysia (Sabah and Sarawak) on human rights in the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) region. The consultation was organised by Land Empowerment Animals People (LEAP) and the Women’s Aid Organisation, with support from the Southeast Asian Women’s Caucus in ASEAN (Women’s Caucus).

The two-day consultation included the following topics and activities:

Introduction to the Women’s Caucus,
Introduction to ASEAN and its human rights mechanisms, including the ASEAN Charter and Human Rights Declaration, ASEAN Intergovernmental Commission on Human Rights, ASEAN Commission on the Promotion and Protection of the Rights of Women and Children, and ASEAN Committee on the Implementation of the Declaration on the Protection and Promotion of the Rights of Migrant Workers,
Open Space Technology to explore women’s priority issues in East Malaysia,
Introduction to UN human rights mechanisms, including legally binding instruments ratified by Malaysia, and particular focus on the Convention to Eliminate All Forms of Discrimination Against Women and the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples,
Discussion of strategies and plans for the Women’s Caucus in East Malaysia, including advocacy strategies to use regional and international mechanisms, and
Group feedback and circle of support and solidarity.

Please visit LEAP’s Facebook page to view photo albums from the consultation.

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Spatial Planning for Conservation and Sustainable Development in Sabah

Holly — Thu, 23 May 2013 08:00:00 +0000

On 23 May, Holly Shrumm (Natural Justice) attended a day-long meeting on spatial planning for conservation and sustainable development in Sabah, Malaysia, which was organised by Hutan and the Malaysian branch of the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF-Malaysia). With an overall emphasis on establishing the technical information-base for a holistic landscape approach to planning, participants highlighted the following points, among others:

The need for a multi-stakeholder integrated approach with a common vision and concerted strategy that focuses on connectivity, viability, complementarity, target-setting, and cost-efficiency (known as ‘systematic conservation planning’),
The need to fill knowledge gaps in the spatial data such as location of ‘good quality’ forests, social-cultural values, and distribution of biodiversity and threats to it,
The importance of providing technical inputs into the draft 20-year Sabah Structure Plan, including social safeguards in line with the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, and
The importance of also planning for governance, management, implementation, and enforcement.

Participants also discussed unique considerations required for marine spatial planning, impacts of climate change (particularly on plant life), implications of different definitions of ‘forests’ (for example, if oil palm plantations were to be included), and the need to protect islands and mangroves from further developments.

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Community Visioning Workshop in Melangkap

Holly — Mon, 11 Feb 2013 11:04:00 +0000

Harry Jonas (Natural Justice) worked with Lanash Thanda and Alice Matthew (Borneo Conservancy) from 8-10 February to facilitate a workshop in Melangkap, a cluster of villages in Sabah, Malaysia, to begin to explore the communities’ futures. The participants looked ahead to Melangkap in 2030 to think through what might be the positive and negative changes, and to think through how to avoid the negative. The workshop and related meetings with the communities’ Ketua Kampungs (leaders) constitute preparatory work ahead of assisting the communities to develop a community protocol and to engage external stakeholders.

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Community Visioning Workshop in Melangkap

Holly — Mon, 11 Feb 2013 11:04:00 +0000

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International Conference on Heart of Borneo Initiative

Holly — Wed, 07 Nov 2012 14:41:00 +0000

The proposed Heart of Borneo boundary

(in yellow). Courtesy of WWF-Malaysia.

The island of Borneo is one of the world’s major biodiversity hotspots, with thousands of plant and animal species found nowhere else on earth. It is politically divided into the Malaysian states of Sabah and Sarawak, the Indonesian provinces of West, Central, South, and East Kalimantan, and the state of Brunei Darussalam. In 2007, the three national governments signed the Heart of Borneo Declaration, a unified conservation vision for “maintaining Bornean natural heritage for the benefit of present and future generations”. The Heart of Borneo initiative, which is facilitated by the Worldwide Fund for Nature-Malaysia (WWF-Malaysia), aims to protect 22 million hectares of the largest contiguous forest in Southeast Asia through effective management of forest resources and a network of protected areas, productive forests, and other sustainable land uses.

From 6-7 November, Holly Shrumm (Natural Justice) attended an international conference entitled “Heart of Borneo +5 and Beyond: Shaping and Nurturing Sabah’s Future Together”. Held in Kota Kinabalu, Sabah, the conference was organised by the Sabah Forestry Department and co-hosted by a range of other government agencies and non-governmental organisations, including the Sabah Biodiversity Centre, Partners of Community Organisations in Sabah (PACOS Trust) and Land Empowerment Animals People (LEAP).

The first session on global perspectives on conservation included a diverse group of presenters, most notably, on renewable energy (Dr. Daniel Kammen, Energy and Resources Group, University of California-Berkeley), on the connections between people and forests (Dr. Tint Lwin Thaung, Executive Director, The Centre for People and Forests), and on the drivers of deforestation (Rhett Butler, founder of Mongabay.com).

The second session introduced a new and complementary initiative called “Forever Sabah“, which aims to transform Sabah’s current trajectory into a diversified, conservation-based green economy. The multi-stakeholder panel was moderated by Darrel Webber (Secretary General, Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil) and included interventions from Sam Mannan (Director, Sabah Forestry Department), Cynthia Ong (LEAP), Anne Lasimbang (PACOS Trust), Dr. Glen Reynolds (the Royal Society’s South East Asia Rainforest Research Programme), Jeffrey Horowitz (Avoided Deforestation Partners), and Abdullah Latiff Mohamad (WWF-Malaysia).

The bulk of the rest of the conference consisted of breakout sessions (which included presentations and open discussions about next steps for Heart of Borneo) on the following five themes: forests and biodiversity; agriculture and plantations; infrastructure and energy development; community development; and tourism. When the groups presented their outcomes in plenary, a common thread throughout – bolstered by strong representation of Indigenous community members from across Sabah – was the need to recognise Native Customary Rights and land title and to ensure participation of Indigenous peoples and local communities in the Heart of Borneo design, implementation, and monitoring and evaluation process.

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New IIED Article on Community Protocols

Holly — Wed, 03 Oct 2012 21:56:00 +0000

Credit: Nick Lunch

As delegates prepare for the 11th Conference of Parties (COP 11) to the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) from 8-19 October in Hyderabad, India, Krystyna Swiderska of the International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED) has prepared an article tracing the community protocols developed by two communities, the Raika of Rajasthan, India and the Dusun of Sabah, Malaysia to claim rights guaranteed by the CBD and the Nagoya Protocol on Access to Genetic Resources and the Fair and Equitable Sharing of Benefits Arising from their Utilization to the CBD.

The article notes that “although they have conserved important biodiversity of the regions where they have lived for generations, many communities are struggling to safeguard their biodiverse resources.” It presents community protocols as a way that communities are asserting their rights and engaging with outside actors. It then details, with text and photos, the unique ways of life of the Raika and Dusun and how they are using community protocols to protect their rights.

The article can be found here. IIED’s recent publication on community protocols, rights and consent, drafted and edited in partnership with Natural Justice, can be found here in English and here in Spanish.

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Imbak Canyon Ethno-forestry

Holly — Wed, 29 Aug 2012 18:50:00 +0000

Harry Jonas of Natural Justice presented on “ABS: From International Law to Local Realities” at a workshop hosted by Yayasan Sabah and Petronas in Kota Kinabalu, Malaysia. The workshop focused on how best to develop and implement an ethno-forestry study in Imbak Canyon. The study is “a long term project leading towards the positioning of Imbak Canyon as the centre of learning for indigenous communities in biodiversity conservation and sustainable use of natural resources, for gene bank conservation and the exploration of pharmaceutical and biotechnological potentials.” Other presenters included Dr Agnes Lee Agama (Global Diversity Foundation) and Dr Charles Vairappan (University Malaysia Sabah).

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REDD+ Readiness Workshop in Sabah

Holly — Thu, 02 Aug 2012 01:45:00 +0000

From 31 July to 1 August, Holly Shrumm (Natural Justice) participated in a workshop on Malaysia’s emerging national institutional framework for Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation in Developing Countries (REDD+). The meeting, held in Kota Kinabalu, Sabah, was part of a three-year ”REDD+ Readiness” joint project between the United Nations Development Programme and the federal Ministry of Natural Resources and the Environment (NRE).

The workshop included presentations on the following topics:

“Introduction to REDD” by Dr. Elizabeth Philip, head of REDD+ Unit, NRE;
“Sabah REDD+ Preparedness Roadmap” by Fred Kugan, Sabah Forestry Department;
“Draft Recommendations for Institutional Framework” by Lee Kian Foh, project consultant; and
“Free, Prior and Informed Consent within REDD+” by Maximilian Conrad, REDD+ Unit, NRE.

The workshop also included breakout groups and subsequent plenary discussions on social and environmental safeguards, financing and sharing of benefits, and measuring, reporting and verification. Natural Justice participated in the safeguards group alongside local organisations such as Partners of Community Organisations (PACOS) Trust and Jaringan Orang Asal SeMalaysia (JOAS), the Indigenous Peoples Network of Malaysia.

More information, news and analysis of REDD+ is available at: www.redd-monitor.org.

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