Malaysia: Demand for rare orchids blooming into thefts in parks

New Straits Times 1 Sep 13;

JOHOR BARU: Buyers pay as much as US$10,000 (RM33,000) for a rare slipper orchid in national parks here for tissue culturing.

Johor Malaysian Nature Society (MNS) chairman Vincent Chow urged the authorities to beef up enforcement to prevent the depletion of orchid species.

Tissue culture involves exposing plant tissue to a specific regimen of nutrients, hormones, and light under sterile, in vitro conditions to produce various hybrids, each a clone of the original mother plant, over a short period of time.

However, to produce the hybrids, one needs to get the mother plant.

Chow said this in conjunction with the upcoming launch of his 152-page book called A Photographic Tribute To The Wild Orchids of Johor National Parks today.

The book, published by MPH, is a collaboration between Chow and the Johor National Parks.

Chow, who is born and bred in Kluang, was trained as a teacher of Agriculture Science at the Maktab Perguruan Temenggong Ibrahim in 1967 to 1968. He received his Bachelor of Agriculture Science with Honours and Master of Science in Horticulture from the Louisiana State University in the United States. He is a fauna and flora specialist consultant registered with the Department of Environment.

He published his first book, Echoes of Life: Sungai Pulai and Beyond, in 2006.

A Photographic Tribute To The Wild Orchids of Johor National Parks is his fourth book, and first collaboration with the the Johor National Parks.

He is working on two other books: one on the freshwater fishes in the national parks in Johor and a second volume on blooms of national parks.

"Trekkers may pass by a rare orchid and not even realise it. The worst thing is to step on a rare species and not even know it.

"Another thing I would like to emphasise is the lack of education on local animal species and plant species."

Johor is the leading state in the cultivation of cut flowers of hybrid orchids.