JOHOR BARU: Malaysia has improved its ranking in a worldwide performance index for environmental management, thanks to government initiatives which give focus on sustainability under the New Economic Model.
In figures released on Thursday night from the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, Malaysia now ranks 25th among 132 nations under the Environmental Performance Index (EPI).
Malaysian EPI team chief Prof Datuk Dr Zaini Ujang said the latest ranking made Malaysia the best among other Southeast Asian countries, and third best among Asia Pacific nations, after New Zealand and Japan.
"In 2010, Malaysia stood at number 54 out of 163 countries worldwide, as compared with Singapore which was at number 28 the same year. Singapore now stands at number 52 in the index.
"We are now in the same group of high performance nations such as Germany, Iceland, Finland, Denmark, Japan and Belgium," said Zaini.
"This was possible through government initiatives under Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak's administration which gives weight to sustainability through the New Economic Model," said Zaini, who is also Universiti Teknologi Malaysia vice-chancellor.
The EPI was developed by Yale University and Columbia University, both in the United States, with the cooperation of the European Commission and World Economic Forum. It is used to evaluate the sustainability of a country through two main objectives: environmental wellbeing and effects of pollution on people's wellbeing.
The EPI is intended for policy makers to place importance on a target of providing transparent data, based on 25 environmental performance indicators, including climate change, agriculture, fisheries, forestry, water and air pollution that could affect life on the earth's surface.
Zaini said the cabinet had last year approved the usage of EPI on composite data gathered in relation to the country's environmental and natural resources management.
A 20-man panel from UTM spearheaded the collection of data with the help of 10 ministries.
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