KUANTAN, May 13 — The Pahang government has identified several forest areas to be proposed as new Permanent Forest Reserves (HSK) to balance development needs with environmental conservation, the State Assembly was told today.

Pahang Menteri Besar Wan Rosdy Wan Ismail said the state executive council,  at its meeting last April 22, approved an application to gazette government land within the Central Forest Spine Ecology network, namely the Bera Forest Reserve and the Bera Ramsar Reserve, as HSK areas involving a total of 524 hectares.

“The total area of Pahang is 3.60 million hectares, while the size of the Permanent Forest Reserves currently stands at 1.589 million hectares, representing 44.13 per cent of the state’s total land area.

“One of the state government’s key policies through the Pahang Forestry Department is to implement the concept of Sustainable Forest Management in forest management,” he said.

He was responding to a question from Mohd Zakhwan Ahmad Badarddin regarding the size of the state’s forest reserves and policies aimed at balancing development with environmental preservation.

Wan Rosdy said the state government would continue ensuring that any HSK area degazetted for economic development purposes would be replaced with another forest area of equivalent value.

“The current state policy requires every approval for degazettement to be accompanied by a replacement area. I have reminded the forestry department to ensure the replacement area is genuinely available before any approval is granted,” he said.

He added that about 762,000 hectares, or 49 per cent of the total HSK area, are classified as production forests for sustainable forest product activities.

“The protected forest area covers about 820,000 hectares, equivalent to 51 per cent. These areas cannot be logged at all. However, if development needs arise, the area may be degazetted on the condition that it is replaced with another equivalent area,” he said.

Responding to a supplementary question on compensation received for forest conservation efforts, Wan Rosdy said Pahang had received about RM72 million in ecological fiscal transfer allocations through federal government project grants since 2022.

“I have also requested Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim to provide the allocation in cash. If it cannot be fully given in cash, I requested at least 50 per cent in cash and the remainder in projects, but so far all allocations have been channelled in the form of projects,” he said. — Bernama