Welcome to Mike's Website

I rejoined the staff of the Wildlife Conservation Society in February 2003 after nearly two years with Lincoln University as coordinator of the Sarawak-Lincoln training programme. 

The WCS programme in Malaysia is likely to expand in the next few years. The administration of National Parks and Wildlife is being revamped, with a newly-formed corporation - the Sarawak Forestry Corporation Sdn Bhd - taking over the operational side from the Forest Department. The State Government has indicated that they would like WCS to continue to work with the Corporation on wildlife issues, especially the implementation of the Master Plan for Wildlife in Sarawak. WCS provides technical input to several programmes aimed at improving management in National Parks in Sarawak, including work on orang utan in Batang Ai NP, on red banded langurs in Maludam NP and on seasonal changes at Loagan Bunut NP. We have also run a training course to enable the Corporation's wildlife enforcement staff to identify the wildlife and wildlife products they encounter during their work.

My main component is an expansion of our programme in the Upper Baram area. WCS has been researching the effects of hunting on wildlife in the area for many years and working with the Forest Department and the logging company to limit hunting to subsistence hunting by local residents. We are now considering a major research programme to investigate the use of selectively-logged landscapes by wildlife and to make recommendations for wildlife-friendly management of production forests. 

Some species of animals require huge areas to maintain viable populations, either because their food resources are thinly spread (as in the case of top predators) or because their habitats occur as small patches (eg forest next to small streams). For these, national parks and wildlife sanctuaries are just not big enough. But most have been recorded in disturbed forests and we need to know more about their requirements for living in a landscape matrix consisting of sustainably managed production forests and shifting agriculture. So we will be looking at a wide range of habitat characteristics, especially food resources for these wide-ranging animals, and at the long-term evolution of the forest managed for sustainable timber production.

At the moment we are putting together ideas on precisely what we want to monitor and discussing options with various stakeholders (local people, the Government, the logging company, and so on) before submitting a formal proposal for funding.

Looking for the Protected Area Training web site? Click here.