ASEAN-wide effort needed to protect sea turtles

All round effort to protect turtles
The Star 22 Oct 09;

KUCHING: Multilateral conservation efforts are needed within the Asean region to protect turtles and their habitats, Sarawak Forestry managing director Datuk Len Talif Salleh said.

He said this was because turtles in the region migrated from area to area, such as from Sarawak’s southern coast to the Philippines and Kalimantan, Indonesia.

“The turtles have no nationality, so the joint involvement of Malaysia, the Philippines, Brunei and Indonesia is very important in ensuring that they can be effectively protected and conserved,” he told reporters after witnessing the deployment of 150 reef balls around Pulau Satang Besar off Telaga Air near here on Monday.

Len said turtle conservation measures could be discussed in the Sosek-Malindo (Malaysia-Indonesia social and economic cooperation) or BIMP-EAGA (Brunei-Indonesia-Malaysia-Philippines East Asean Growth Area) forums.

For a start, he said Sarawak Forestry officers would work with their counterparts in Sabah and Indonesia to look into protecting turtle migration areas along their respective coastlines.

He also hoped a common understanding could be reached on laws relating to turtle conservation and protection, such as banning the sale and consumption of turtle eggs.

On the reef balls, Len said their deployment aimed to protect turtle habitats besides enhancing marine life and preventing illegal trawling.

He said over 2,500 reef balls had been deployed along Sarawak’s coast since 1998 but more were still needed to protect areas such as the seabed off Kuala Lawas, a feeding ground for dugongs and turtles.

“In the next five years, we hope to deploy another 10,000 reef balls which will cost at least RM12mil.

“We hope to speed up the deployment by enlisting support from the private sector to help sponsor the reef balls,” he said, adding that each ball cost about RM1,000 to construct and another RM300 to transport and deploy.

Sarawak Forestry chief wildlife warden Wilfred Landong said the reef balls had been effective in reducing turtle deaths from being caught in trawler nets.

He said the number of dead turtles reported around the Talang-Satang National Park was now about 20 a year compared to 70 to 100 annually before the reef ball project commenced.

In addition, he said the number of nesting turtles at the national park rose from 737 in 2004 to 1,104 last year.

The number of turtles tagged at the park for monitoring purposes also increased from 639 in 2004 to 1,028 last year.