MIRI: The collaboration among Asean countries has resulted in a greatly reduced impact of transboundary haze over the last few years, Natural Resources and Environment Minister Datuk Seri Douglas Uggah Embas said yesterday.
He said member countries’ compliance with the agreement on transboundary haze pollution, signed in 2002, and the regular meetings of Asean ministerial steering committee on haze, had contributed to a better understanding to address the issue.
“I have been in this ministry for three years.
“You notice that we have been lucky that we didn’t experience what we had experienced in 1997 to 1998, which was a very bad haze,” he told reporters here after attending the Miri Division disaster relief management committee here.
He said the collaborations that began with the sharing of strategies to combat illegal burning activities had also been enhanced to include joint efforts in installation of weather and air monitoring systems.
To date, Malaysia, Indonesia and Singapore are spearheading the efforts to install air monitoring stations in the Riau and Jambi provinces in Indonesia. — Bernama