EXAMPLES OF MANGROVE USE FROM MALAYSIA

Most mangrove forests in Malaysia are found along the meandering coastline of Sabah (350,342 hectares) followed by those in Sarawak (172,792 hectares) and in Peninsular Malaysia (123,482 hectares). Sustainable extraction of wood for charcoal and construction materials is a major and widespread activity. It is possible to maintain a sustainable yield with appropriate management; for example, in the Matang Mangrove Reserve an average felling cycle of 30 years is practised, and in Johore there is a 20-year cycle with a thinning cycle of about 10 years. Sustainable fisheries are also of major importance, with traditional equipment including gill nets, barrier nets, bag nets, cast nets, traps, hooks and lines. About 30 species of fish and 9 species of prawn have been obtained by using cast nets in the Kapar mangroves, which gives some idea of diversity. In Peninsular Malaysia, the preponderance of mangrove forests along the west coast rather than the east is strongly reflected in the fisheries statistics as shown in the table. They are in accordance with the belief that there is a positive correlation between mangroves and fisheries production.
An interesting fishery is that for jellyfish, which are routinely harvested in the Rejang estuaries of Sarawak between February and June each year. They are brined and processed for export markets in Japan and Taiwan. There are highly productive cockle culture sites on some mangrove foreshores in Peninsular Malaysia, and other sites have floating net cages for the culture of sea bass, grouper and snapper. The Pulau Ketam mangroves support well over 2000 of these floating net cages.

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