Rahmah Elfithri

The change in climate has been observed over comparable periods of time. Mangrove ecosystem and its biodiversity are threatened due to climate change. Sundarbans mangrove ecoregion situated in Bangladesh (~62%) and India (~38%) is a bioclimatic zone. Sundarbans is one of the largest reserves for the Bengal tiger (Panthera tigris tigris L) which is the top predator. Therefore, it helps to regulate the number and distribution of prey, which in turn impacts forest structure, composition and regeneration. As climate change affects the flora and fauna in this ecosystem, these may be impaired because of migration of the species. The tigers become stray from forests to human inhabitants and causes tiger human conflicts which often results in retaliatory killings of tiger and human and or livestock. Therefore, the main objective of this study is to identify the effects of climate change towards the salinity intrusion and biodiversity, modification of floral and faunal composition, habitat l...

The Urban Eco-Sustainable Index for Upscaling Water Security at Catchment Level in Langat River, Malaysia has developed by using the Modified Watershed Sustainability Index or MicroWSI (MWSI), which was based on the Participation, Design and Management Components. The study has successfully applied spatial and social dimensions on ecohydrology of the selected Langat River reach for stormwater management, natural ecosystems health and quality of life. The planning and public participation aspects of the study have evaluated the surrounding neighborhood area of Langat. The conceptual design of rehabilitation works implementation related to Urban Stormwater Management Manual for Malaysia (MSMA) Stormwater Management Ecohydrology (SME) within the study area has been developed with four components of MSMA-SME to be implemented in the study area i.e Bioretention System, Porous Pavement System, Constructed Wetland and Slope Protection Works. These components were proposed to be applied in ...

The concept of Integrated Water Resources Management (IWRM) was first introduced in Malaysia since 1990s in various forms. However, the key issue remained how to implement it? IWRM can be best implemented at the basin level by using an Integrated River Basin Management (IRBM) approach. IRBM as a subset of IWRM is an approach to water resource management that takes into account all the factors linked to the resources, including social and economic activities. The implementation of IWRM at basin level in Malaysia has been initiated in managing water resources and river basin in Langat River Basin, Malaysia. The Langat River Basin is a transboundary river basin and is one of the Evolving UNESCO-IHP HELP Basins since 2004. The basin is small but has inherited many problems of a large river basin. This is because the river plays an important role in conservation, agriculture and potable water supply, but is facing threat from rapid development in the industry sectors and urbanization in ...

Langkawi is an island which is characterized by its exceptional geological and biological landscape, ecological diversity and wildlife, cultural and heritage values, recreational and tourism attraction, and uniqueness of its own local community. Langkawi has been selected as UNESCO Global Geopark since 2007 (the first in Southeast Asia). In 2015, Langkawi has been selected as one of the UNESCO Sustainability Science Demonstration Sites to apply sustainability science concepts for resolving water and environmental-related issues in the area through education and ecotourism, linking with local stakeholders. Identification of issues and challenges related to water and environmental sustainability towards sustainable development in Langkawi Geopark has been done through (1) local stakeholder consultation workshop; (2) field data collection and survey on water and environmental quality state condition in Langkawi; (3) water quality sampling; (4) questionnaire distribution to local stakeholders and community; as well as (5) detailed discussion/interview sessions with selected local government agencies, local authorities, private entities, NGOs, and local community in Langkawi Geopark. Six key issues related to water and environmental sustainability in Langkawi have been identified out of 21 issues that occurred in Langkawi Geopark. A strategic recommendation and way forward towards sustainable development in Langkawi Geopark have been formulated for implementation, including promoting sustainability science as a platform to respond to the future needs in dealing with water and environmental sustainability-related issues in Langkawi. The sustainability science framework for action has been developed with five ways of feasibility (stock and flow feasibility; environmental feasibility; social, cultural, institutional, and policy; integration; and monitoring and evaluation). The Community Learning Alliance for Sustainability Science (CLASS) through Langkawi Research Centre (LRC) of LESTARI, UKM, has also been recognized as a pathway towards sustainability to promote sustainability science practices in Langkawi Geopark.

The project “Restoring and Managing Langat River Basin, Malaysia, for the Future” is an initiative carried out by LESTARI, UKM under the UNESCO framework of Sustainability Transformation across the Region (STAR) with Jap­anese Fund In Trust (JFIT) financial assistance. Sustainability science as a new emerging field can be a tool to solve a complex environmental anthropogenic is­sue by promoting an integrated approach of various disciplines, multiscale, and across stakeholder. It is a problem-driven and solution-oriented approach in cre­ating a sustainable society and requires problem-solving skills. Thus, the estab­lishment of sustainability science demo site in the Langat River Basin involved the integration of the sustainability science concepts into natural resource man­agement frameworks and processes for supporting opportunities for a more sus­tainable and resilient future. This initiative is linked with Ecohydrology, HELP, and IWRM aspects and focused on applying sustainability science principles to strengthen policy, legal, and institutional frameworks through collaborative link­ages, learning alliances, and targeted interventions for capacity building at river basin and national levels on urban stormwater management. The key objective of this sustainability science pilot project is to develop and implement a restoration and management plan for urban stormwater resources in the Langat River Basin using a sustainability science approach. Qualitative and quantitative data collec­tion in the fields of hydrology, hydrogeology, pollution sources, ecosystems, and cultural preservation as well as development of the land cover-state model is done under this study. It is shown that the Langat River Basin is small but has inherited many problems of a large river basin. This is because the river plays an important role in conservation, agriculture, and potable water supply but is facing threat from rapid development in the industry sectors and urbanization in the basin. Some key strategies and action plans have been identified to deal with is­sues related to restoring and managing Langat River Basin for the future.

Malaysia has been Integrated water resources management (IWRM) and making considerable progress since past few decades. An Integrated River Basin Management has been inaugurated in the Langat River Basin as part of IWRM implementation through newly formed Selangor Water Management Authority (LUAS) in 1999. This paper critically reviewed the scientific, management and evaluation literatures and reports on water resources management of this river catchment area. The study denotes, although a significant development it achieved, this river basin organization can be bettered in terms of its organizational structure, manpower strength and experience and balance between top-down and bottom-up decision making process by integrating social learning process. The growing challenges due to the inevitable effects of critical factors of economic growth, population increase and climate change impacts within Langat River Basin for the efficient and effective operation of river basin system. The ai...

Integrated Water Resources Management (IWRM) is a comprehensive approach to the development and management of water, addressing its management both as a resource and the framework for provision of water services. It includes social, economic, and environmental factors in the planning, development, monitoring and protection of land and water resources.

Despite many good policies and institutions, the coastal environment of Langkawi continues to deteriorate. This could be due to lack of effective governance as well as unregulated waste discharge. Evidences collected from the literature during 1996 to 2013 also revealed a significant increase in the concentrations of Zn (R2 = 0.78) and Pb (R2 = 0.12) in the sediment. This appears to be the result of large volume of terrestrial runoff that brings these metals originating from extensive anthropogenic activities. It is a vital indicator of coastal pollution. It is a matter of concern that in many cases Pb concentration in the sediment exceeded the world average value 20 μg/g as well as Canadian Interim Sediment Quality Standard of 35 μg/g for the coastal areas. Similarly, the metal pollution index (MPI) measured over a period of 2007 to 2009 in fish also indicated an increasing trend of pollution in Langkawi. The maximum MPI value (4.87) was recorded in Spanish mackerel. Since pollut...

Page 1. The Arab World Geographer/Le Géographe du monde arabe Vol 12, No 3-4 (2009) 234–235 © 2009 by AWG Publishing, Toronto, Canada Index to /du Volume 12, 2009 Authors/ Auteurs Abd Rahim, Sahibin. See Gasim, Muhammad Barzani 51 Abd Rahim, Sahibin. See Gasim, Muhammad Barzani 188 Abu-Zahra, Nadia, and Price, Hayley, The Effects of Cabinet Shuffles on Development Projects: A Case Study on Global Education in Jordan 19 ...

Water ecosystem deterioration can be affected by various factors of either natural environment or physical changes in the river basin.. Data observation were made during dry season (April 2017) and wet season (December 2017). 21 sampling stations were selected along Kenyir Lake Basin. Overall, the water quality status as stated in NWQS is categorized as Class I on dry season and Class II on wet season. The major pollutants in Kenyir Lake are Total Suspended Solids (TSS), Chemical Oxygen Demand (COD), Dissolve Oxygen and pH which are contributed largely by untreated or partially treated sewage from tourism development and construction activities around the basin. The sedimentation problem level in the Kenyir Lake Basin is not in critically stage but the flow rate of water and land use activities (development around basin) will be contributed to the increasing levels of sedimentation. The good site management such as the implementation of proper site practice measures to control and t...

The study on Watershed Sustainability Index (WSI) has been conducted to analyst the environmental condition in the area incorporating ecological baseline and socio-economic conditions. WSI is an integrated indicator based on basin Hydrology, Environment, Life and Policy (HELP) state condition. It is suitable to be applied in the Langat River Basin in Malaysia which has similar catchment area (up to 2,350 km2) and is one of the UNESCO HELP River Basin since 2004. The WSI analysis which uses a pressure–state–response function based on basin HELP Indicator was done for Langat River Basin by using relevant available 5 years data for the period of 2009 to 2013. It is found that Langat River Basin is having WSI value of 0.68 which falls under the category of medium sustainability (between 0.5-0.8). Based on the maximum value (i.e. 1) or high sustainability (i.e. WSI value more than 0.8) it can be said that Langat is in the good side in term of sustainability. Few management aspects need t...

Water pollutant loadings and river discharge are among the basic data used in determining the dynamicity of a river. The input of water quality and river discharge are usually available through the collection of water samples in the field or at the observatory, and are done automatically using the data logger sensor. This paper discusses the concentrations pollutant load water quality and its relationship with discharge (m3/s) using Event Mean Concentration (EMC) in the Alur Ilmu, UKM source from the Diptrokarp forest at Hutan Simpan Bangi (2˚55'14.72 "N 101˚ 46'57.37" E). Alur Ilmu is a 1.79 km long stretching across the main campus of National University of Malaysia before flowing into the Langat River. Water quality was measured using automatic gauging and continuous water quality stations which are installed at downstream of Alur Ilmu (2˚55'40.33 "N 100˚46'47.15" E) and involves in measuring the parameters of total dissolved solid (TDS) and di...

Solid waste always produce negative impacts to the environment, thus effective solutions must be implemented. However, most people are not concerned of the importance of recycling. At the Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia (UKM) which has already launched the sustainable campus programme in 2007, the initiative to managing the solid waste and conducting the recycling programs were advocated through the Zero Waste Campus Initiative (ZWCI), where the team are committed to do the awareness, practices and ...

Integrated Chemometric and Artificial Neural Network were being applied in this study to identify the main contributor for flood, predicting hydrological modelling and risk of flood occurrence at the Kuantan river basin. Based on the Correlation Test analysis, the relationship for Suspended Solid and Stream Flow with Water Level were very high with Pearson correlation of coefficient value more than 0.5. Factor Analysis had been carried out and based on the result, variables such as Stream Flow, Suspended Solid and Water Level turned out to be the major factors and had a strong factor pattern with the results of factor score with >0.7 respectively. Time series analysis was being employed and the limitation had been set up where the Upper Control Limit for Stream Flow, Suspended Solid and Water Level where at this level, it was predicted by using Artificial Neural Network (ANN) to be High Risk Class. The accuracy of prediction from this method stood at 97.8%.

A variety of opinions and understanding of the term has been used to provide vision on the need to produce the best individuals and of quality from the current education system. Sustainable humanitarian mind in this paper refers to individuals who have a high quality not only in terms of knowledge, skills, attitudes, personality and enthusiasm but also those who

Abstract: The management of river and water resources in Malaysia remains fragile and inherited with many problems of a river basin. Rivers in Malaysia play an important role in conservation, agriculture and potable water supply but they are facing threat from rapid development in the industry sectors and urbanization. This study attempts to focus on the current situation of water issues in Malaysia in particular on perspectives and initiatives pertaining to Integrated River Basin Management (IRBM) within the more encompassing ...

The concept of Integrated Water Resources Management (IWRM) was already recognized in agenda 21 of the United Nations “Earth Summit” on Environmental and Development that was held in Rio de Janeiro in 1992. At the World Summit on Sustainable Development (WSSD) in Johannesburg in 2002, the international community has also took an important step towards more sustainable patterns of water management by develop IWRM and water efficiency plans with support to developing countries (Mokhtar, et al, 2004).

This paper aims to develop decision-support tools and protocols for use by the Malaysian water industry to assess the relative sustainability of stormwater systems and projects. One of the most essential parts of urban stormwater management (USWM) is the pollution control due to construction, that's why, the decision-making in any USWM project is especially complex since it involves a large number of stakeholders and large variety of domains of knowledge, ie both technical and managerial (planning, assessing, decision- ...

The study area is located in the southern part of the Cameron Highlands region of Malaysia, at longitude 101° 20′ to 101° 35′ E and latitude 4° 19′ to 4° 31′ N. This study was conducted to determine land-use categories, the percentage of land-use changes, and their impact on the Bertam River catchment by reference to 1984, 1995, and 2002 land-use maps. At least six categories of land use were noted during the 18-year observation period: forests (reduced by 7 615 ha from 1984 to 2002), tea farms (reduced by 657 ha), bodies of water ( ...

This paper explains the study that is on-going in the Langat River Basin, Malaysia on Collaborative Decision Making (CDM) among agencies that are related to water resources management. The Langat Basin encompasses areas within the Selangor State, Negeri Sembilan State and Putrajaya Federal Territory. There are many agencies and institutions that are involved in management and development of rivers and water resources in this basin, which include the various federal and state government agencies, private ...