collaborative efforts to advance education and awareness programs

Our colleagues began this quarter by conducting two separate meetings with SMK Pengerang Utama and SK Kampung Baru Pasir Gogok, to discuss the proposed school awareness programme and activities for the year. Representatives from our partners, such as Pengerang Independent Terminals Sdn. Bhd., MyKasih, and Pejabat Pendidikan Daerah (PPD) Kota Tinggi also joined the discussion. We then conducted two indoor awareness programmes with these schools, involving a total of 202 students.

Besides the school programme, we also carried out an awareness programme with participants from the Pengerang Independant Terminals Sdn. Bhd., during which we covered basic knowledge and understanding of mangroves, seagrass and coral reef ecosystems. We also discussed the roles of corporations and industries in protecting and preserving the environment.

Growing our program: Volunteer Seagrass Monitoring and Education

Together with six volunteers from DIALOG Group Berhad, we began our first quarterly seagrass monitoring program at Tanjung Kopok. This will be an ongoing initiative to observe the changes in seagrass cover near the Johor rives, which is part of our long-term seagrass conservation programme in southern Johor. The volunteers were also taken on an educational boat tour to explore uniqueness of the mangrove forest found along the Johor river and its significance to the local marine habitat and community livelihood.

Our team in Johor has also engaged with representatives from Majlis Bandaraya Pasir Gudang (MBPG) to introduce Reef Check Malaysia’s ongoing marine conservation programme in the area and discuss potential environmental programmes that can be conducted together. This is also part of our efforts to increase local community awareness of seagrass and mangrove ecosystem found along the Johor river.