Friday July 17, 2009
Threat to Hawksbill turtles
By MARTIN CARVALHO and CHEN PELF YEEN
MALACCA: A proposed private development project on Pulau Upeh, off the coast here, could see one of Malaysia’s top nesting sites for the endangered Hawksbill turtles being lost for good.
Located off the reclaimed land in Limbongan, the 2.5ha island has a 100m stretch of beach which is home to some 100 turtle nests, almost 30% of the entire estimated 350 nests in peninsular Malaysia.
The latest threat to the nests comes from the approval by the state government to a private company to revive and expand the island’s abandoned resort.
File pix of Pulau Upeh Chief Minister Datuk Seri Mohd Ali Rustam said the Government had made up its mind to develop the island as a tourist spot.
“I believe it can succeed this time as tourism development in Malacca is extraordinary,” he said on Wednesday.
In the late 1980s, the state developed a resort and 120 chalets on the island through the State Economic Development Corporation.
However, it was abandoned in the mid-1990s and the state subsequently sold it to Tenaga Nasional Bhd as a training centre for RM10.4mil in 2003.
A private company applied to carry out the latest revival project and the state approved it last week.
Mohd Ali said the company, which would begin work next month, would increase the number of chalets to 200.
He noted that the state had earlier proposed to the Fisheries Department to convert the island into a turtle-nesting centre but the proposal fell through due to lack of federal funds.
Worldwide Fund for Nature Malaysia chief technical officer for peninsular Malaysia Surin Suksuwan expressed shock when told of the revived resort project.
“We are concerned that the project, if carried out indiscriminately, will result in irreversible impact on the turtles nesting and their nesting behaviour,” he said.
He said the WWF had briefed state officials three weeks ago on the turtles and proposed a low-impact turtle eco-tourism project.
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