KUALA PENYU: The upgrade of Rumbia Information Centre’s (RIC) ecotourism facilities has been completed.
The centre was officially handed over to State Forestry director Datuk Sam Mannan at a ceremony here yesterday.
Sam said the RM2 million upgrade was fully completed on March 7 this year and was funded by the Ministry of Tourism Malaysia under the 10th Malaysia Plan.
“With the completion of the project, the centre is now better equipped to receive the growing number of tourists visiting the centre and with facilities to promote Rumbia, a non-timber forest produce, particularly on its usage such as production of sago which is traditionally used and consumed by the Dusun Tatana, Bisaya, Brunei and Kadayan communities in Kuala Penyu,” he said.
RIC is built around living sago palm swamps which enable visitors of the centre to have a closer look at sago palms in their natural habitat.
“The department foresees that the RIC will contribute toward supporting the growing tourism industry which in turn helps to generate spin-off benefits to the local communities,” said Sam.
In addition to surrounding attractions such as the Klias FirefliesRiver cruise, Klias Proboscis Monkey River cruise, Klias Wetland and Tunku Abdul Rahman Park (Pulau Tiga), Sam hopes that tour operators will include RIC as one of the places of interests in their tour package to support this endeavour.