While in theory, the Malaysian government is committed to increasing agriculture productivity to meet local and international demands, the reality is far from being realized. Instead, some bizarre and brutal actions taken by the government are paradoxical to what it pledges. Just recently, the Pahang state government, by claiming that it intended to uphold the noble cause of “environment protection”, launched an enforcement operation against some durian farms in Raub.
The Pahang Forestry Department boasted that some 15,000 trees were chopped down in merely nine days, notwithstanding that a flash flood happened in some areas in Raub right after the enforcement was carried out.
Studies show that many agricultural activities would cause pollution or environmental degradation to a certain extent. As such, researchers and academics would usually propose establishing stronger collaboration between the government and the farmers in order to minimize the problem while ensuring the sustainability of agriculture.
A responsible, caring and far-sighted government should educate the farmers about ways to preserve the environment and provide training and technical assistance to minimize the ensuing problems caused by farming. It should also actively collaborate with the local farmers to come up with strategic plans to move towards sustainable agriculture.
Themalaysianinsight.com reports on the fact that destroying farms that had been cultivated by small farmers for 10 to 20 years, on the other hand, was simply mind-boggling and terrifying.