By Olivia Miwil - December 9, 2021 @ 10:32am
KOTA KINABALU: Sabah Agriculture and Fisheries minister Datuk Seri Dr Jeffrey Kitingan was questioned over the Nature Conservation Agreement (NCA) at the Sabah Assembly sitting last night.
The hour-long session saw a hot debate between Jeffrey and Datuk Seri Mohd Shafie Apdal (Warisan-Senallang) as the former kept explaining about the mechanisms of carbon trade instead of answering questions.
Mohd Shafie had asked whether the state had signed an agreement with a Singapore-based firm Hoch Standard Ptd Ltd to manage the trade and its track records; whether the Chief Minister, who has authority on Sabah forests delegated it to Jeffrey to implement the trade; and whether the state Attorney General's Chambers (AGC) letter to the said firm was authentic.
"This matter (agreement) has been approved by the Cabinet and it has given power to the Chief Minister to implement and realise the responsibility.
"I have the local standi to answer this question," said Jeffrey who is also Deputy Chief Minister.
He however said the agreement between the state and Hoch was signed by the chief conservator of forests, Datuk Frederick Kugan as the land involved would be forest reserve.
As for the Sabah AGC's letter addressed to Dr Ho of Hoch Standard not to proceed with the agreement, Jeffrey said he respected it as the AGC was doing his work in protecting the interests of Sabah.
However, he said there was no contradiction nor conflict as it was just due to wrong timing as the AGC had not received the addendum which was an addition to the signed agreement.
Jeffrey said the addendum was not ready as the area had yet to be decided.
He also assured that the agreement would not involve selling lands nor affect native customary rights lands, but merely focused on conservation and monetising carbon credit.
As for the status of Hoch Standard, the state government would initially allow only 600,000 ha of land to be involved in the trade and up to two million ha should the firm prove its capabilities.
"It has nothing to do with Kinabalu Point nor Terra Australia … Hoch standard is Hoch Standard. Singapore has set up a global platform and we use them because they have access to companies and financial institutions around the world.
"When you sell carbon credit, you need this group of people. If we had the capacity to do it before, how come we never did it all this while? We do it now because we have a platform".
The 100-year agreement was signed on Oct 30, which would see the company receive 30 percent of the shared gross revenue.
Jeffrey had previously in a public engagement session said it was estimated that there would be 20 tonnes worth of carbon credit per ha valued about USD20 (RM83.59) per tonne.
He added that Sabah could earn up to RM9 billion from the nature capital in coming years as compared to depleting income of RM200 million from current forest revenue.
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