MalaysiaGIS.com

Source: The Star (page 14)

He said Prime Minister Datuk Seri Dr Mahathir Mohamad recently repeated his concern over such activities.

At present, developers had the tendency to flatten hilly areas for development purposes, he told reporters after witnessing the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) between the Malaysian Centre for Remote Sensing (Macres) and the Peninsular Malaysia Forestry Department (JPSM) here.

"It's not a good practice because it spoils the landscape and beauty of an area. In the end, the buyers have to pay more to purchase such property," he said.

Law said the brainstorming session would involve town planners, architects, engineers and developers' association and the revelant ministries.

On the MoU, he said Macres and JPSM would work together on forest mapping, road track logging and tree mapping using remote sensing via satellite.

Law also said Macres would provide the technology on specific areas in order to have an organised planning in Malaysian forestry.

He said Macres' effort would be much easier when the satellite ground receiving station in Temerloh, Pahang, was completed and fully operational next year.

At the moment Macres obtained data and satellite pictures from Thailand which was time consuming as it depended on the priority of the ground station in that country.

Law said the Temerloh station would be able to cover 2,500 km in radius including South East Asia, Sri Lanka and part of China and India.

JPSM director-general Datuk Zul Mukhshar Datuk Mohd Shaari said with the MoU, JPSM would be able to save time and money on forest mapping and also detect illegal logging.

"Satellite pictures would be able to help us manage the forest in a more organised manner and to prevent destruction of tree species when road logging tracks are done in an area," he said.

Macres was offcially established in August 1988 and became fully operational in January 1990.