Sustaining the forest beyond

Cultivation of oil palm (as means) to sustain the rainforest ecology built around the existing original lowland dipterocarp forest eco-systems.
View of Zone G from Zone C, looking south

Botanic Island Two in the background

 There are two M's that can help me make the forest ecology of Kambatik Park a success.  First M is a strong MIND, a will if you care.   Second M  is the MEANS, without which you cannot develop and later maintain a nature park.  The park was fortunate because from its inception the existing preserve of original vegetation was not totally destroyed.  They were isolated and preserved as botanic islands of which there are currently four.  The oil palm cultivation were integrated around the islands , streams, swamps, slopes, roads and hills in order  not to destroy the original land form exceedingly.  Income from the oil palm harvests is the principal means to sustain the operation and maintenance of the forest ecology.  It is important to bear in mind that the real beneficiaries of the park are the wildlife and plants ecological diversity  and we humans need to re-learn to co-exist with them to really benefit from natural world, be it in agricultural productivity, tourism-related business or recreational activities.  Today when I take walks in the park, I feel so much peace with myself for having positively contribute to the  understanding and standing for nature.  The Kambatik Park is a first step in my journey to really take care of nature by seeing beyond the trees.

Plain areas as fallback positions in time of flash floods due to torrential rains

Natural and man-made forest eco-system integration

Eastern Crimson Sunbird brave itself to come out of the jungle to search for food on the cultivated garden areas of the park

Mormon butterfly in the Botanic Island Two

A walk in the park is the simplest means to commune with nature

Less is more

 I am a fortunate guy.  The park is my lab for understanding nature in my private time and place.  Living in a lowland dipterocarp forest environment has provided me with the opportunity to internalize the global concerns of global warming, rainforest destruction, disappearing natural wildlife and untoward corporate greed.  For example the capitalist model of massive consumption has brought much destruction of nature.  In oil palm monoculture, whole original forests in Sarawak are stripped to ground zero only to be replanted with a single oil palm crop.  This unimaginative capitalist urge in corporations is largely driven by quantitative results in the name of  maximum profits.   But in the Kambatik philosophy less is more.  Here oil palm is well-integrated into the existing agro-forestry practices that resulted in increased bio-diversity, more value to the land as in potential economic spinoff in eco-tourism.  In particular this concept can uplift Sarawak into the only state in the world to possess a string of  park lands and nature reserves that can sustain itself through oil palm integration.  Imagine the total length of 800 km of Sarawak's country side situated along the trunk road turned into a continuous  band of wildlife, rainforest biodiversity, eco-tourism centers and the longest learning lab in the world.  This is my hope.

Oil-palm integration into native agro-forestry practices...

A pair of Brown -throated Sunbird finds home at the Kambatik Park...