Collaborative forestry research wins award
Published on: Thursday, June 13, 2024
By: Winnie Kasmir
Dr Tan (centre) with Dr Arthur (left) and Razy Japir at the Forest Research Centre, Sepilok in 2022.
SANDAKAN: A collaborative research between Dr Tan Ming Kai of National University of Singapore and Sabah Forestry Department has won Sabah’s Best Biodiversity Research
Award under the International Researcher Category, organised by Sabah Biodiversity Centre.
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Dr Arthur YC Chung and Razy Japir are the local collaborators for Dr Tan for the research entitled “Contribution to the Taxonomy and Ecology of Orthoptera from Rainforest Discovery Centre (RDC), Sandakan, Sabah”.
Dr Tan, also a research associate with the Natural History Museum of Paris, France, is a specialist on the insect order Orthoptera that includes crickets, katydids and grasshoppers.
Besides taxonomy, diversity and ecology, he studies the calling songs of crickets and katydids for acoustic bio-monitoring.
In this research, a total of 12 scientific papers were published and five species new to science were described.
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Through this collaboration, he has examined the Orthoptera collection at the Forest Research Centre (FRC) in Sepilok, and assisted in producing a biodiversity poster on Orthoptera for environmental awareness, as well as presented a talk to FRC researchers and staff.
The Chief Conservator of Forests, Datuk Frederick Kugan is glad that such collaboration is not only benefitting international researchers but also local researchers in terms of capacity building and sharing of research knowledge.
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Research findings from this study would contribute towards biodiversity conservation and advancement of research in forest insect diversity and ecology.
To date, there are more than 70 collaborative research projects under the Sabah Forestry Department with various local and international research institutions, with FRC researchers as local collaborators since 2020.
Frederick also noted that RDC is not only known for environmental education and forest recreation but also for tropical forestry research.
The biodiversity award was presented on June 11 in Kota Kinabalu, in conjunction with the State level World’s Biodiversity Day.
The local collaborators represented Dr Tan Ming Kai in receiving the award from the Assistant Minister to the Chief Minister, Datuk Abidin Madingkir, who represented the Chief Minister during the event.
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