During this Covid-19 pandemic year, the Tioman Marine Conservation Group (TMCG) on Tioman Island were able to successfully remove 37 ghost nets weighing over 4,000 Kg, removed over 700 Crown-of-Thorns starfish, conducted over 60 reef surveys, and installed 15 mooring lines in the ocean.

TMCG, also known as the “ghostbusters” due their frequent ghost nets cleanups, began as a small group of five from Kampung Tekek and Kampung Air Batang in 2015, has now expanded to a total of 65 members spanning all seven villages on the Island.

The members are all local islanders who have expressed an interest in marine conservation and being a part of managing the island’s resources.

Born and raised on Tioman island, Shahir B Yaman, one of the founding TMCG member shares, "I am proud and thankful to have this opportunity to gain skills from the programme and now lead the TMCG. We are not only conducting conservation activities but also creating awareness among the community and acting as role models. TMCG is a good example for Malaysia on how local islanders can protect their island.”

Reef Check Malaysia (RCM) has organized various trainings to equip the TMCG members with skills and knowledge which they can apply to assist in day-to-day marine resource management activities, such as installation and maintenance of mooring buoys, removal of ghost nets and marine debris, bleaching monitoring, Crown-of-Thorns Starfish monitoring, coral rehabilitation, and so on.

The team is led by Alvin Chelliah, Senior Programme Manager of RCM. “We learned that protecting the ocean is beyond just coral reef monitoring and surveys and we had to look at initiatives that directly involve and impact the community. We slowly shifted our focus to participatory management – an approach where responsibilities are shared among various stakeholders, from local communities, government or non-government actors, to policymakers. And that is how the TMCG came about,” Alvin shares.

The training and setting up of the TMCG was fully sponsored by Yayasan Sime Darby. The group was later supported by the Department of Marine Parks Malaysia and is currently sponsored by a matching grant from the Ministry of Finance.

RCM hopes to strengthen the TMCG and replicate this success with communities on other islands, providing new livelihood opportunities that do not rely entirely on tourism, and at the same time strengthening reef conservation through a participatory approach to management. 

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About Reef Check Malaysia

Reef Check Malaysia (RCM) is part of the world-wide Reef Check network. Since it was registered in 2007, RCM has become established as a leader in coral reef conservation in Malaysia and has field teams based in Tioman Island, Mantanani Island, and the Johor Islands. Its activities are organised around training survey divers and conducting coral reef surveys at over 200 locations around Malaysia to monitor coral reef health, working with stakeholders to improve the management of coral reefs in Malaysia to secure long term conservation goals, conducting studies on reef resilience and rehabilitation to better understand coral reefs and impacts, and raising awareness of the importance of coral reefs and the valuable ecosystem services they provide. https://www.reefcheck.org.my/