KOTA KINABALU: A thousand trees were recently planted at the Crocker Range Forest Reserve which is situated south of the World Heritage site of Mount Kinabalu, here.
The Crocker Range Forest Reserve covers an area of 350,584 hectares. It consists of mountain chains, hills and valleys and is home to a wide variety of vegetation, from tropical lowland forests and hill dipterocarp forest, to upper montane forest.
More than 150 staff from Petronas, the Sabah Forestry Department, local community, as well as other governmental departments and agencies took part in the conservation activity.
The tree planting was made possible with Yayasan Petronas, the national oil company's Corporate Social Responsibility arm, which focuses on environmental conservation.
Petronas Sabah and Labuan general manager Rokiah Sulaiman said the environmental programme was a continuation of a collaboration with the Sabah Forestry Department from previous years.
"Last year, we planted 1,000 trees at the Kawang Forest Reserve in Papar and another 2,000 mangrove seedlings to rehabilitate a mangrove forest in Tuaran in 2015 and 2017.
“We will continue to collaborate with relevant authorities and communities through our Sentuhan Alam focus area.
"We hope such programmes will continue to ensure we are able to collectively and actively contribute towards the conservation of the environment for the benefit of future generations,” she said in a statement.
Besides tree planting, Petronas also included 100 students from St Michael's Secondary School in Penampang in an environmental awareness workshop.