The Current Climate Change Trend In Malaysia

Climate change is rapidly increased and become very serious global issue. The emission and concentration of carbon dioxide and greenhouse gases is affecting the increase in temperature, and thus leading to global warming. The world community is very concerned with the impacts of climate change and the current series of extreme weathers that could possibly affect the global climate systems.

In developed countries such USA, Europe and Japan, their community are increasingly aware of and concerned about global climate change and supportive of a wide range of mitigation and adaptation policies. Unfortunately, we also still know very little about international public opinion or behavior regarding climate change, in large part because only a few multi-national surveys have included even a single question on the issue (Leiserowitz, Kates, & Parris, 2005; Brechin, 2003). Large majorities worldwide believe that human activities are a significant cause of climate change, yet many continue to confuse and conflate global warming with depletion of the ozone layer, which in turn leads many to support ineffectual solutions, such as the banning of aerosol spray cans.

Malaysia is one of the countries in the world which is experiencing a warming trend for the past few decades. According to IPCC in year 2001, the global land precipitation has raising about 2% since the early of the 20th century. They also reported in year 2007, the extremely hot temperature, heat waves and heavy precipitation events will contribute to become more frequent. In the past few years, the frequency of long dry period tended to be higher with significant increase in the mean and variability of the length of the dry spells. All the indices of wet in these areas show a decreasing trend. Increasing temperature with long dry periods would give variable result of weather and climate (Deni et al., 2008).

According to INC, 2000; Malaysia’s temperature and rainfall are rapidly increasing between +0.6 to 3.4C and -1 to +32% in 60 years repetitively and the rise of sea level is about 13-94 cm within 100 years respectively. Thus, these will give impacts on water resources, coastal zone, public health, food supply, drainage, flooding, land slides, haze, typhoons, and others negative phenomenon that need national and international responses to face climate change. Realizing the importance of reducing and combating the impact of climate change and GHG’s emissions, the Malaysian government has taken concerted efforts towards this issue by introducing the mitigation programs in the Ninth Malaysian Plan.

2.0 PROBLEM STATEMENT

Malaysia’s desire to achieve the status of a developed country by the year 2020 will require rapid economic growth and expansion, especially in the urban, industrial and commercial sectors. Economic growth is guided by the principles of sustainable development. The extent to which sustainable development is achieved will ultimately depend on the ability of the country to monitor and manage the impacts of economic activities on the environment. NGOs continue to advocate national efforts to address such issues as the economics of climate change, the compilation and publication of timely data on GHG emissions, and projections of energy consumption by different end-users.

Most Malaysian is not aware of the effects of global warming. Being in a hot climate country and most likely holed up in their air conditioned offices, most did not notice the changes in daily temperatures. Rising temperatures from global warming are creating violent storms in Malaysia for the past few years. A disaster caused by climate change or global warming could be defined as a serious disruption to the functioning of a community or a society causes widespread human, material, economic or environmental losses which exceed the ability of the affected community or society to cope using its own resources.

Prediction about impact of climate change on public health are general, there are no specific region scenarios is available. Nevertheless, Malaysia can expect significant impact mainly because of its tropical weather with high rainfall and temperatures that make dangerous combinations for air factor, food diseases, and illness due to air pollution. In Malaysia public perception on climate change is not well documented. Hence, this objectives, want to discover the perception on climate change. With such poor understanding on structure in the climate system, people are likely to rely on the intuitive “wait and see” strategy that works well in a range of everyday tasks.

3.0 OBJECTIVES

The purpose of this survey is to assess the public opinion, perception, and understanding regarding the current climate change trend in Malaysia. The objective includes:-

1. Public perception and awareness of the seriousness of climate change

2. The extent to which public informed about climate change.

3. To determine public attitudes towards the solution to climate change.

4.0 SIGNIFICANCE OF STUDY

Public should be taught more about GHG that are held responsible for climate change issues. Since climate change is affecting evrything all over the world, thus, by having sufficient or extra understanding or more specifica, knowledge about this issue can be the most important way to adress our attention about it and the solution towards it. This research will contribute to public understanding about the current as well as future issue on climate change by providing information about the key point that should be seriously concentrate in environmental education effort.

Climate change is widely recognized as the hottest issues on the current international environmental agenda. Climate change gives implications for many events such flood and water shortage, food supplies, human health, and social and political initiatives. Public awareness of environmental issues generally, many people lack understanding of the delicate interrelationships between man, and all species of animals and plants to climate change. There is quite small number of people that able to relate their daily activities to environmental harmless whether in the short and long term effects. Most of them only concern about the impacts of climate change without knowing the exactly causes of climate change. Since people generally have very basic knowledge about climate change, it is probable that many rely on the mass media as a primary source of information about this topic.

The purpose of this research also to know the effectiveness of environmental regulation in Malaysia; hence this explanatory research which is a combination of literature review, data collection and interviews can be used to encourage the responsible bodies to formulate further solutions on the issues associated with climate change.

5.0 LITERATURE REVIEW

a. Climate Change

Issue on climate change arises as the increasing a number of tragedies and disaster phenomenon occurred in Malaysia. Kedah and Johor are the worst states that experienced floods recently. An analysis of temperature records in Malaysia shows a warming trend. For the assessment of the impacts of climate change on agriculture, forests, water resources, coastal resources, health and energy sectors, temperature changes ranging from +0.3°C to +4.5°C and rainfall changes ranging from -30% to +30% were used. Several fixed sea level rise scenarios within the range of 20-90 cm in 100 years were adopted for the assessment of impacts on coastal resources (INC, 2000). Every 10C temperature rise may cause 10% reduction in rice yields and prolonged drought conditions may adversely impact the current flooded rice ecosystem, putting national food security at greater risk (MOSTI, 2000).

GHG emissions from sources and removal by sinks resulting from human (anthropogenic) activities have been estimated and included in the inventory. Natural processes lie outside the scope of the inventory. The sources and sinks were grouped under five categories, namely, energy, industrial processes, agriculture, land use change and forestry, and waste. According to NAHRIM, 2006 and Wan Azli et al., 2008, modeling results estimate that temperature in Malaysia may become warmer by mid and end of the century. A substantial increase in monthly rainfall over the North East Coastal region and decrease in monthly rainfall in West Coast of Peninsular Malaysia may be expected. Future river flows in several watersheds in East Coast of Peninsular Malaysia were simulated as increases in hydrologic extremes when compared with their historical level.

Generally, Malaysia is considered as a free zone from climate related disaster. However, mild climate-disasters are quite frequent to happen lately. These refer to the occurrence of floods and droughts that caused significant socio-economic impacts to the nation while the occurrence of land slides due to excessive rainfall and strong winds happened at the hilly and the latter, at the coastal areas caused minimal damage. The floods incidence happened in the southern states of Malaysia, such as Negeri Sembilan and Johor. There are many obstacles remaining, including our limited understanding of the current status of Malaysian public opinion and the unknown potential for rapid social change to dramatically reduce global greenhouse gas emissions at a rate fast enough to forestall large-scale climate disruptions.

Malaysia’s national policy on sustainable development is based on a balanced approach such that environment and development complement each other. While the past and existing national policies and initiatives may have indirectly addressed climate change concerns under the context of sustainable development, the need to formulate a dedicated climate change policy is increasingly recognized. Therefore, the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment Malaysia in collaboration with the Institute for Environment and Development (LESTARI), Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia, had conducted the Policy Study on Climate Change. The aim of the study was to develop a national policy and strategies on climate change in fostering sustainable development in Malaysia to meet the needs of the country and respond to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC).The other stakeholder consultants regarding to climate change issue are Ministry of Science & Technology and Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment, DOE, Ministry of Health and Institute of Medical Research, Environmental Protection Society of Malaysia, SIRIM, Maritime Institute Of Malaysia and Business Council for Sustainable Development.

To address climate change issues, RMK9 initiates the following mitigation programs such:

1. Increase supply and utilization of alternative fuel such Renewable Energy.

2. By 2010, about 300 MW of RE is expected to be generated and conducted to the TNB Grid in Peninsular Malaysia and 5o MW to SESB Grid in Sabah

3. RE project utilizing municipal waste will be promoted

4. Encourage energy efficiency in industrial, building, and transport sectors.

5. Protect forest areas via sustainable forest management to ensure the forest areas are maintained as sink to GHG, i.e., CO2.

6. Conduct Coastal Vulnerability Index study

7. Implement coastline protection program

8. Implement flood mitigation program such as Stormwater Management and Road Tunnel (SMART) Project

9. Undertake study to identify the relationship between the impacts of climate change and vector borne diseases.

5.0 Methodology

The purpose of this study is to investigate public opinion, perception, and understanding regarding the current climate change, and to reach this aim, respondents will be selected randomly to fill questionnaire form which would be used to collect the data for this study. This chapter is to presents the methods used to achieve the objectives of the study.

The study will be conduct in 2 areas in Johor Darul Takzim where in urban cities (Johor Bharu) and rural area (Segamat) to gather the information on the public understanding regarding the climate changes trends in Malaysia. A survey will be conduct to assess the public awareness regarding the current climate change in Malaysia. Questionnaires will distribute and the collection data will be use as primary data to know the level of public understanding regarding to this study.

Method to Analyze Data

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