THE Kelantan government will not stop logging activities in the state as they are carried out in accordance with the terms and conditions stipulated under the National Forestry Act 1984, deputy Menteri Besar Mohd Amar Nik Abdullah said.

He said logging activities in Kelantan were conducted according to stipulated regulations.

Each state is given a quota by the National Forestry Council, and there is a condition where, after the felling of trees, reforestation has to be carried out in the affected area, he added.

He said the trees had a certain age period, after which they had to be felled to prevent them from falling onto, and destroying, other growth.

“For example, if the quota given for this year is 3,000ha, then we should not exceed the 3,000ha. Otherwise, we will be subject to action by the National Forestry Council. The quota is not determined by the state, but the National Forestry Council.

“Logging provides revenue not only for Kelantan. In fact, almost all states depend on forest products, especially Pahang and Sarawak,” he told reporters when met after listening to Menteri Besar Ahmad Yakob’s New Year message at the Kota Darulnaim Complex in Kota Baru today.

He said this when asked on an online petition for a moratorium on logging and on preserving forests as a bulwark against floods, which has received nearly 200,000 signatures.

The petition, titled “Henti Pembalakan & Kemusnahan Alam Sekarang”, was co-sponsored by the Muslim Youth Movement of Malaysia (Abim) and an environmental group, the Association for the Protection of the Natural Heritage of Malaysia (Peka).

The petition was launched to urge the government to impose a moratorium on logging activities for the time being following the catastrophic floods.

Amar said logging activities were not the main cause of the floods in the state, as it had been a phenomenon that occurred almost every year.

Furthermore, no tree felling is allowed between October and December due to the monsoon season, he added.

“Those that were swept by the floods (during the monsoon season) may have been felled before that period and stored at the Beta (log storage area),” he said and urged the public to not blame logging activities alone as the cause of the floods. – Bernama, January 6, 2022.