GREEN TURTLE REPLICA PROJECT

Beach at Bavang Jamal, Kudat

The Kudat Turtle Conservation Society (KTCS) together with Raleigh Sabah Society are going to need volunteers to help clean the beaches on November 20 to 26, 2017 around Bavang Jamal Beach, Kudat. They need as many people as possible to make their program a success. Whenever we saw our beaches and all those rubbish, I am sure deep inside us we said, "why don't the government do something about those thrashes?" Well fella, our government isn't going to do anything about it! They feel they have other more important agenda to consider. Not cleaning beaches and towns! So it all falls back to us to help. We have to start somewhere. If we looked around we would be overwhelmed and do not know where to start. Too many of our beaches and towns are full of rubbish! So let start here, where they are already societies willing to organize. All we have to do is answer their call and help out. In the meantime, let's take a break and enjoy spending our time in Kudat where the place is peaceful and serene; and fresh seafood for dinner!

Wastes at the beach

Working together among volunteers to cleanup unwanted rubbish can make a difference. It can boost the citizen's pride and believe it or not; can also help to reduce crime. According to the Nebraska Extension in Lancaster County website, "time and time again, in cities across the nation, neighborhood crime rate dropped after cleanup and beautification efforts!" Volunteers can bring rakes, brooms, shovels, thrash bags, gloves and first-aid kits. To encourage community spirit, they could bring refreshments to be shared among the volunteers. Please remember that these wastes are creating problems for our marine creatures. Many turtles died after consuming plastic bags floating around the sea because they thought the plastic bags are jellyfish, their food.

Another eyesore

What should we do with these wastes? Well, there is an interesting technology which could recycle these plastic thrashes into pellets. These pellets in turn could be used to make asphalt. Asphalt is one of the ingredients for road building. The government should subsidized the recycling plants that ventured into this sort of project. It is said that the asphalt used to resurface roads made from plastic wastes are much better and could last longer compared to those from the petroleum base. But it only takes far-sighted government to see the benefit of this technology.

for more information PLEASE CLICK RALEIGH SABAH SOCIETY or KUDAT TURTLE CONSERVATION SOCIETY

The first English romance-thriller from Borneo
PLEASE CLICK AMAZON or BARNES & NOBLE

BABY TURTLES OF BORNEO: Kudat Turtle Conservation Society (Part 2)

KTCS Information Center

Bear this in mind; an American tourist told me he regretted not coming here 10 years ago. I asked him why? He told me that his friends who came a decade ago, and now with him here for a second visit, informed him that many wonderful sights they saw before no longer exist! Every decade, indeed we are facing environmental destruction; but we and our government are pretending these never happened! When our rivers had been poisoned, trees had all been burned and cut, endemic floras and faunas get extinct, marine life shattered; and nobody want to come to Borneo anymore, only then will we realize what had we done to our environment!

Pathway to the turtle sanctuary

But a few villagers are fighting back. It is a small step but I believe it would be a giant leap forward. Hopefully, their efforts would pave the way for more environmental groups to start some sort of program that would save our ecological, cultural and historical sites from being destroyed.  On February 2007, a small group of passionate village volunteers organized a simple beach cleanup to get rid of the thrashes in and around Kudat beautiful beaches because they knew that the sea turtles and other marine creatures would be harm by these wastes and pollution. From that day onward they named themselves as Kudat Turtle Conservation Society (KTCS).

Beachfront at Bavang Jamal near Simpang Mengayau Kudat

 KTCS are focusing their activities such as beach clean-up, beach patrolling (in order to ensure the safety of the nesting turtles) and also the turtle release program. The turtle nurseries are located at Bavang Jamal, a beachfront sandwiched between Pantai Kelambu and Simpang Mengayau (the Tip of Borneo). According to Norfazilah Rahman, the KTCS Project Coordinator, thousands of baby turtles had been released at this beach. The eggs of the turtles are collected not only from around these areas, but also outside from other parts of Kudat. More efforts are needed to protect the environment because sadly, according to Norfazilah, less and less turtles are coming back to hatch their eggs here.

Norfazilah also told me that KTCS are looking forward for support from the public such as joining their volunteer program, donating cash even for a small amount or the least they can do is to follow them on Facebook. Please do help them in anyway you readers can; because who knows their efforts could be one of the catalyst to save our precarious environment.

PLEASE CLICK Kudat Turtle Conservation Society
for more information and PLEASE CLICK BABY TURTLES RELEASED TO THE SEA to watch video.

The first English romance-thriller from Borneo

PLEASE CLICK AMAZON or BARNES & NOBLE