“Heart of Borneo” Meeting

By Barrie | April 4th, 2008 | No Comments

Indonesia, Malaysia and Brunei Darussalam will hold the Second Tri-lateral Meeting of Heart of Borneo in Pontianak, West Kalimantan, from April 4 to 5, 2008. The upcoming meeting was a follow up of the First HoB (Heart of Borneo) Tri-Lateral Meeting which was organized in Brunei Darussalam, on July 18-20, 2007, a press statement of the Indonesian forestry ministry said here on Thursday.

The Second Tri-Lateral Meeting will discuss a Strategic Plan of Action of the Heart of Borneo, which is expected to become a basic guideline for conservation and sustainable development programs to be conducted by the three countries on Borneo Island or Kalimantan Island which is shared by the three neighbouring Southeast Asian countries.

Previously, the three countries had issued a Bali Declaration recommending the drafting of National Project Document for the implementation of the HoB at national and local levels.

Under the HoB scheme, the three countries have agreed to carry out cooperation programs on trans boundary management, protected areas management, sustainable natural resource management, and sustainable financing.

The Pontianak meeting is expected to agree on the establishment of an HoB institution which would be responsible for the implementation of HoB programs.

The “Heart of Borneo” conservation plan is an initiative intended to protect biodiversity by preserving 220,000 square kilometers of equatorial rainforest on the island of Borneo.

The area protected by the project, which first was launched in March 2006 at a United Nations biodiversity conference in Curitiba, Brazil, includes parts of the territories of the three Bornean nations, reaching from the highlands along the Indonesian- Malaysian border into lower-lying areas in Brunei.

According to the WWF (Worldwide Fund for Nature), the forests of the Heart of Borneo are some of the most biologically diverse habitats on Earth, possessing staggeringly high numbers of unique plant and animal species.

The Heart of Borneo`s forest area is 1 of the only 2 places on Earth where orang-utans, elephants and rhinoceros still co-exist and where forests are currently large enough to maintain viable populations.

The Heart of Borneo presents a unique opportunity to conserve pristine tropical rainforest on a huge scale - almost 30% of the world`s third largest island, WWF reported.

Source: Antara News