Emerging challenges for sustainable development and forest conservation in Sarawak, Borneo

Abstract

The forests of Borneo-the third largest island on the planet-sustain some of the highest biodiversity and carbon storage in the world. The forests also provide vital ecosystem services and livelihood support for millions of people in the region, including many indigenous communities. The Pan-Borneo Highway and several hydroelectric dams are planned or already under construction in Sarawak, a Malaysian state comprising part of the Borneo. This development seeks to enhance economic growth and regional connectivity, support community access to services, and promote industrial development. However, the implications of the development of highway and dams for forest integrity, biodiversity and ecosystem services remained largely unreported. We assessed these development projects using fine-scale biophysical and environmental data and found several environmental and socioeconomic risks associated with the projects. The highway and hydroelectric dam projects will impact 32 protected areas including numerous key habitats of threatened species such as the proboscis monkey (Nasalis larvatus), Sarawak surili (Presbytis chrysomelas), Bornean orangutans (Pongo pygmaeus) and tufted ground squirrel (Rheithrosciurus macrotis). Under its slated development trajectory, the local and trans-national forest connectivity between Malaysian Borneo and Indonesian Borneo would also be substantially diminished. Nearly~161 km of the Pan-Borneo Highway in Sarawak will traverse forested landscapes and~55 km will traverse carbon-rich peatlands. The 13 hydroelectric dam projects will collectively impact~1.7 million ha of forest in Sarawak. The consequences of planned highway and hydroelectric dams construction will increase the carbon footprint of development in the region. Moreover, many new road segments and hydroelectric dams would be built on steep slopes in high-rainfall zones and forested areas, increasing both construction and ongoing maintenance costs. The projects would also alter livelihood activities of downstream communities, risking their long-term sustainability. Overall, our findings identify major economic, social and environmental risks for several planned road segments in Sarawak-such as those between Telok Melano and Kuching; Sibu and Bintulu; and in the Lambir, Limbang and Lawas regions-and dam projects-such as Tutoh, Limbang, Lawas, Baram, Linau, Ulu Air and Baleh dams. Such projects need to be reviewed to ensure they reflect Borneo's PLOS ONE

Evaluating the impacts of land use/land cover changes across topography against land surface temperature in Cameron Highlands

“…Ideally, the development of the policies in Cameron Highlands would be aimed at mitigating carbon emissions from the deforestation of primary forests, which are great carbon storages. The national sustainable development goals (SDG) outline included estimates of the activity data of land use via satellite land monitoring systems through land cover assessments, increased enforcement funding, and educating the locals about proper farming techniques to ensure sustainable farming practices are undertaken [74][75][76]. The situation in Cameron Highlands differs from that in other hotspots, such as Borneo, as there are no large-scale industrial plantations or large agriculture plots in Cameron Highlands but instead small-sized areas of agriculture run by many small shareholders.…”

The distribution of medium to large mammals in Samunsam Wildlife Sanctuary, Sarawak in relation to the newly constructed Pan-Borneo Highway

“…Tropical rainforest in Borneo is experiencing threats from rampant forest conversion, selective logging, hunting for bushmeat, forest fire and wildlife trade (Taylor et al, 1999;Bennett et al, 2002;Kinnaird et al, 2003;Sodhi et al, 2004;Nakagawa et al, 2006;Linkie et al, 2007;Bernard et al, 2009;Gaveau et al, 2014;Brodie et al, 2015a). The proliferation of road construc-tions and expansion in Sarawak in an unprecedented manner jeopardises forest connectivity, fragmenting forests into patches and catalyses anthropogenic activities within and around these areas (Clements et al, 2014;Alamgir et al, 2020). Forest gaps and fragmentation created by roads in forests would, in turn, induce a negative impact on population density, diversity, disruption to animal movements and their daily activities (Laurance et al, 2009;Tsuyuki et al, 2011;Clements et al, 2014;Mohd-Azlan et al, 2018a).…”

“…Despite its adverse ecological effects, constructions and its expansions are necessary to facilitate population growth, increase accessibility and improve socio-economic development, especially in developing countries, such as Malaysia (Perz et al, 2007;Fahrig & Rytwinski, 2009;Clements et al, 2014;Berg et al, 2015). The Pan-Borneo Highway is an active road construction and expansion project throughout Sarawak which aims to connect the southwest to the northwest with a total length of 1060 km with Phase 1 spanning approximately 765 km and is expected to be completed by 2021 (Phan, 2019;Alamgir et al, 2020). The effects of the Pan-Borneo Highway towards the forest connectivity in Sarawak has estimated a loss of approximately 185 km 2 and 52 km 2 of forest connectivity and core forest areas with 1 km buffer from the road (Alamgir et al, 2020).…”

Historical landslide events in Malaysia 1993-2019

“…The deforestation of the highlands for construction activities such as roads and housing often leads to landslides. Deforestation was an important process for any construction at the hilly area that made this area more vulnerable to landslides (20) . Typically landslide in Malaysia has occurred at hilly area due to ecosystem changes in an environment.…”