An Intern's Experience

On 14th June 2010 (Monday) I went to Kuala Gula, Perak accompanying Mr Hyrul as representatives from GEC to facilitate the tree planting activity for the Universiti Malaya students. Kuala Gula is located in the district of Kuala Kurau. Most of the residents in Kuala Gula are connected through fishing activities. The fishermen consist of the villagers while the people that live in the town market fisheries products for local consumption and export to other states and countries.

On 15th of June, at 10 am we went to a nearby food stall for breakfast. At the side of the stall, some people were cutting the legs of crabs. According to them, the crab is called Nipah Crab. The legs is cut so that the crabs can moult. The moulted crab can be harvested for its meat and sold to the market. Next, we went to the mangrove tree nursery. The nursery is run by a local community group, established by GEC in 2006, called Sahabat Hutan Bakau (SHB) or Friends of Mangrove in English. They facilitate any eco-tourism activity that takes place in Kuala Gula such as bird watching and mangrove tree planting.

The students arrived at about 12 p.m. We also had guests from My Khatulistiwa Sdn Bhd, Petri and Shyam. At 2.30 pm, we attended a talk by PERHILITAN at the Kuala Gula PERHILITAN centre. The talk was conducted by the Kuala Gula PERHILITAN Director, Mr Hyrul from GEC and Mr Anwar from SHB. At night, I attended a meeting with SHB with Mr Hyrul to finalize the plans for the tree planting activity.

On 16th of June, we went to Teluk Rubiah for tree planting activity with the guests from My Khatulistiwa. Before any tree planting event starts, SHB has to relocate all the mangrove seedlings to the planting spot in Teluk Rubiah. About 900 seedlings were taken to Teluk Rubiah by them. According to Mr Hyrul, the nursery can support up to 1000 seeedlings. It can be harvested every 3 months for planting.

We went to the site by boat which took off from the jetty at 9.30am. After 30 minutes, we arrived at Teluk Rubiah and started our tree planting activity. The mangrove tree species that we planted was Rhizophora Apiculata. According to Mr Hyrul, that particular tree is chosen for planting so that Teluk Rubiah can have a good mangrove profile. Furthermore, Teluk Rubiah is currently dominated by Avicennia species.

In conclusion, I learned a lot of things that only can be learned through hands-on experience. I also made friends with the community and UM students. It was a good experience and exposure for me. I’m getting a more vivid picture on community involvement in environment conservation.