Ah, to be a hero. Don’t we all want to be one? But how? By donning a spandex costume with a cape to fly around skyscrapers while battling villains? That is sheer comic book fantasy. So should it be by scaling an impossibly tall mountain someplace? That’s not everyone’s cup…

Critically endangered pangolins now have a new champion in China and Vietnam, the two countries where “the world’s most trafficked mammals” are sought most for their scales and meat. That champion is movie superstar and martial arts master Jackie Chan. In a short video entitled “Kung Fu Pangolin” and recorded…

Every now and then reports of orphaned Bornean pygmy elephants being rescued by the Sabah Wildlife Department surface. These baby elephants have become lost while their mothers are nowhere to be seen. In the past seven years 22 baby elephants have been rescued this way. Many of them cannot survive,…

Penang has a problem. Being a relatively small yet populous island, it has little land left for development. Yet the island’s government and private developers want to keep on building. So they are increasingly eyeing as yet undeveloped and underdeveloped patches of seashore and hillside. That, however, poses grave environmental…

We all know that burning sensation: acrid smog stings the eyes and irritates the throat. During the periodic haze from burning forests in Sumatra that envelopes much of Malaysia for days and weeks at a time, millions of Malaysians are exposed to massive amounts of harmful air-borne pollutants. Yet not…

Shambling gait? Tick. Mischievous personality? Tick. Boundless energy? Tick. Malayan sun bears (Helarctos malayanus) are among Malaysia’s most endearing creatures. So named for the reddish crescent-shaped marking on their chest, sun bears occupy much of mainland Southeast Asia, including Sumatra and Borneo. Yet we are seeing less and less of…

It’s not that there were any more proof needed that much of Africa’s wildlife is being decimated at appalling rates, but it has been provided again nonetheless. That evidence came in the form of 23 elephant tusks and 300kg of pangolin scales. They belong to the latest shipments of illicit…

Beautiful beaches. World-class diving spots. Scenic forests. Picturesque landscapes. Misty mountaintops. Fantastic biodiversity. Malaysia is a land of unsurpassed natural beauty with unique treasures. Not surprisingly, tourists from around the world keep flocking to the country. Last year alone nearly 27 million visitors came, generating MR82 billion in tourism income….

If you thought Sabah’s infamous bushmeat culture couldn’t get any worse, think again. The Bornean state, famed for its renowned biodiversity, has long been a hotspot of “exotic” dishes made from the meat of endangered wild animals. The practice is against the law, but there’s been a thriving well-documented black…

If you want a cautionary example of wasteful human activities run amok, look no further than Hong Kong. It’s not that residents of the Chinese territory are more wasteful than others in the developed world; rather, it’s that they have run out of space to store their trash. One of…

Whether we like it or not, palm oil production accounts for a major part of Malaysia’s economy. On the one hand, the industry has generated plenty of income for the country’s economy and created plenty of jobs as well, although most of those jobs are low-skilled and badly paid ones….

First, Aaron “Bertie” Gekoski, an award-winning wildlife photographer and television presenter, introduced us to the heroic men and women who are helping save Sabah’s endangered wildlife. He did so in a series of short online documentariesJoin called “Borneo Wildlife Warriors” with stunning camerawork and revealing interviews. Now the intrepid conservationist has…

Since January last year all mining of bauxite in Pahang has been banned. So how come bauxite exports from the state have increased significantly? Yet increased they have, according to data on bauxite imports from China, which is the final destination of all the bauxite mined in Malaysia. And it…

Ask environmentalists and opposition politicians in Penang, and the island state’s environment is in a parlous state and under constant threat from development. Ask local government officials, however, and Penang is a paragon of environmental protection in Malaysia. To wit: Dominic Lau Hoe Chai, vice-president of the Malaysian People’s Movement…

If you participate in wildlife crimes, directly or indirectly, you should stop. If you do stop, you will be let off lightly. If you continue breaking wildlife laws, however, you risk getting nabbed and possibly slapped with a severe penalty. That’s the message that Abdul Kadir Abu Hashim, director-general of…

Last month, within a matter of days, alert customs officials at Kuala Lumpur’s international airport seized two giant hauls of pangolin scales, which had been flown in from Africa and weighed 712kg in total. This month they discovered yet another giant haul of scales at an air cargo warehouse at…