Bloggers come together for Malaysia's tigers

WWF Malaysia 31 Mar 10;

Tiger BlogFest 2010 - from 19 April to 22 April

Petaling Jaya, Selangor – Bloggers will unite to help wild tigers as the Tiger BlogFest 2010 takes place in conjunction with Earth Day from 19 April to 22 April.

The initiative, which already has 60 confirmed bloggers since it was announced middle of March, was initiated by the nature blog, Planet of the Monyets (planetofthemonyets.blogspot.com).

According to Dr G Balamurugan, founder of the Planet of the Monyets, the Tiger BlogFest 2010 is a forum for bloggers to contribute towards protection of the Malayan tiger.

“The main aim is to increase awareness by reaching out to the large on-line community. It is estimated that the combined traffic to the participating blogs is about 100,000 visitors per day – giving the plight of the tiger the publicity it duly deserves,” he says.

The BlogFest aims to have 100 or more participating blogs, locally and globally, to help spread awareness on the critical problems faced by tigers in the wild. Bloggers can express their concerns in any form, from sharing personal experiences, writing a poem, posting videos, draw cartoons or simply highlighting articles on tiger conservation in any preferred language.

This initiative is enthusiastically supported by WWF-Malaysia’s Tx2 Campaign as it will help enhance the public’s awareness and participation in tiger conservation efforts in Malaysia, one of the campaign’s objectives.

“Monitoring of tigers and increasing patrol teams to reduce poaching threats are some of the work that WWF-Malaysia carries out to protect the tiger. However, the Tx2 campaign will only be successful when there is a critical mass of Malaysians who believe in the cause,” emphasised Dato’ Dr. Dionysius Sharma, CEO / Executive Director of WWF-Malaysia.

The campaign has set up a website at www.tx2.my whereby members of the public can sign up for free and help spread the Tx2 message.

A talk on tigers and their conservation efforts will be held on April 17 at the WWF-Malaysia office to assist participants in familiarising themselves with tiger conservation issues. For more information or if you wish to participate, you can log on to planetofthemonyets.blogspot.com or email to gbm.ere@gmail.com

-End

For further information, please contact:
Dr G Balamurugan, Planet of the Monyets
(T) 03-8024 2287
(E) gbm.ere@gmail.com
URL: planetofthemonyets.blogspot.com

Sara Sukor, Tx2 Campaign Coordinator for WWF-Malaysia,
(T) 03-7803 3772 ext 6421
(E) ssara@wwf.org.my