Back to Borneo, and an Eden at Risk

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/02/23/travel/back-to-borneo-and-an-eden-at-risk.html?_r=0

By KAREN J. COATES 

FEB. 21, 2014

Pa Lungan in the Kelabit Highlands of Sarawak, Malaysia. Credit Jerry Redfern for The New York Time

 There are no roads to the village of Pa Lungan, just a mucky water buffalo trail beneath a tight-knit canopy — among the last standing highland jungles on the island of Borneo. In spots, the trail is more swamp than path. But that does not mean all is quiet: The rain forest is a cacophonous place. Cicadas squeal and monkeys hoot as they romp through the trees. Bamboo creaks in the breeze as its stalks grind and rub in a primitive dance.

Our journey through Borneo began seven years ago, when, on a whim, my husband and I visited the Kelabit Highlands, situated in Sarawak, one of two Malaysian states on the island. I’d been invited to a conference in the capital city of Kuching; with some time on our hands, we headed to this remote region, most easily accessible by turboprop plane, which flew a few times each week from Miri, on the coast, to the small town of Bario. (The alternatives were many hours, even days, on precarious logging roads, or several weeks on foot through the forest.) 

Thanks to a reporting fellowship, we found ourselves back in the Highlands last year. Things had changed somewhat — that flight now leaves twice daily, and a newly graded dirt road eases travel in and out of Bario. 

The town had grown slightly — more houses, a few concrete-slab roads — but the tempo had not. Bario Asal, the town’s original longhouse, remains, albeit a bit quieter than in years past. But local families still gather by unvented fires in a common area filled with smoke and chitchat. Tourists come to see this. “More tourists, every day,” a Kelabit elder named Jenette Ulun said — one or two a day, sometimes a dozen. “There are more tourists than us locals,” she joked.

Photo

The Parill family at the Bario Asal longhouse. Credit Jerry Redfern for The New York Times

For centuries, the Kelabit people lived isolated lives, best known to the outside world as champion headhunters. But that began to change under the reign of the so-called White Rajahs, a British family by the name of Brooke, who reigned in Sarawak from 1841 to 1946 and tried to rid the region of headhunting. 

Meanwhile, Christian missionaries converted the Kelabits in the 1940s and clamped down on alcohol consumption. Ever since, the Kelabits, who now number about 6,000, have gladly practiced evangelical Christianity with ceremonies far less laborious than their old animist rituals, they say. And the Kelabits have modernized in other ways: Gone are skulls hanging from the rafters, replaced by fireside cellphones and laptops.

Until a few years ago, travelers came for the “Bario Loop,” and other multiday treks organized by local Kelabit guides that hugged the Indonesian border through jungles now logged. These days, most visitors take shorter hikes and experience Kelabit culture in local homes.

Photo

Typical Kelabit fare (pounded rice cake, chicken soup, mushroom soup and fried wild vegetables) at Henry Lagang’s guesthouse in Pa Dalih. Credit Jerry Redfern for The New York Times

On our first trip to Bario, my husband and I lodged at De Plateau, a homestay near the forest leading to Pa Lungan. I remember the cold-water showers and the outdoor sink, which faced a panorama of blue-green hills bathed in flowery air. Dinners consisted of fried wild boar, fiddlehead ferns and sautéed, burgundy-red ginger flowers.

We hired a guide who led us up and down a sodden trail, a foot-long blade called a parang hanging from a scabbard at his hip. Five hours on, we found Pa Lungan, set like a mountain oasis amid verdant, dewy grasses and sparkling ponds. That’s where we met Walter Paran, our village host. He took us to his wooden house set on stilts, where we met his wife, Moriaty, and his then-toddler daughter, Mujan. Walter’s mother squatted by a blackened hearth, tending a pot of simmering cucumber. “Very simple food,” Walter said.

Photo

Kids take a sunset joyride around the Pa Dalih longhouse in Sarawak, Malaysia. Credit Jerry Redfern for The New York Times

We also met Walter’s brother, Pasen Mado Inan, who praised the forests around him. “Most of the things we need for every day come from the jungle,” he said. He feared it would disappear — the trucks were getting closer. “We hate the logging.”

Walter asked us to return so he could take us deeper into the forest, “before logging disturbs that side.” As my husband and I flew out of Bario a few days later, we saw early evidence of what he feared. Below, thick jungle turned to naked hills laced with ruddy roads. “No one can stop them,” our pilot said. “It’s disgusting.”

Photo

One of the guest rooms at the Jungle Blues Guesthouse in Bario, Sarawak, Malaysia. Credit Jerry Redfern for The New York Times

For years, I wondered what became of Walter, his family and their forests. I read of jungles all over Borneo, chopped and cleared, replanted with palms. To raze a rain forest is to bulldoze one of the earth’s biggest carbon stores. To erase this forest would also be to annihilate an age-old way of life. 

Seven years later, we returned, again flying a turboprop into Bario. This time, we stayed with Stephen Baya, a Kelabit artist, and his Danish wife, Tine Hjetting, in their homestay-gallery called Jungle Blues Dream, in a longhouse overlooking the wild yonder of rice paddies, homes and wooded hills that disappeared each morning in a shroud of fog. Stephen, a self-taught artist, fills his wooden walls with vivid trees of life, a motif that symbolizes, for him, a “journey never-ending.” Stephen was born in the Highlands but spent years working for Hilton, Holiday Inn and a Printemps department store elsewhere in Malaysia. He prefers Bario. Living the city life, he said, means “always having to think about tomorrow, think about next week.”

Photo

Walter Paran, a local guide. Credit Jerry Redfern for The New York Times

When I told Stephen of my search for Walter, he relayed the message. Spotty cellphone coverage now permeates parts of the jungle. (We later learned that if Walter wedges his phone into one particular window and stands back, he can sometimes maintain a conversation.) Walter successfully received Stephen’s message and said he awaited our arrival.

Stephen drove us to the road’s end, and from there, we hoofed it, packs on backs, sticks in hand. Along the way, elements of our first trip came back: the tests of balance provided by bridges the width of two logs that spanned streams and broad swaths of mud; an avenue of palms beneath higher, old-growth trees. We stopped at the palms, sat on a log and ate canned chicken curry. In the distance, we heard what sounded like faint, high-pitched voices. There were no trails, no villages, no one around. Perhaps it was wind, making the treetops squeak. Elders later spoke of talking spirits that occasionally spook villagers on foot in the forest.

Pa Lungan was idyllic as ever. We found Walter’s home, but he was out somewhere. Moriaty and Mujan, who was 9 by the time of our return visit, offered us instant coffee, fried shrimp crackers and a seat at their long wooden table. After a cold bucket shower and a short rest, we joined a party next door: Village hunters had caught a boar that morning, and its head crackled on the fire. They offered strips of hot, juicy fat and grilled petai beans, known for their sulfuric stench but delicious flavor.

The sky that evening was a spectacle of tropical-fruit colors: tangerine, passionfruit, papaya. Then darkness fell, and Walter’s generator rumbled on. The power allowed for a few efficiency lights, and a TV — the latter an addition since our previous visit. Mujan lay under a blanket, watching Bruce Lee chop his way through “Fist of Fury.” 

In the morning, we were greeted by Walter, who remembered us and had many things to share. He wanted to show us why tourists still come to Pa Lungan. “They love the place because it’s still green,” he said. 

Nearby Pulong Tau National Park was expanded in 2008, creating a buffer between his village and the logging threat, he told us. He said Pa Lungan remains a “nice, quiet place” — for now.

Together, we hiked a nearby mountain, across the soft earthen floor beneath palms that Walter’s ancestors had planted generations ago. The forest was dense. “This one you can call primary jungle,” he said. From there, we scrambled a near-vertical climb to the hilltop, where a giant metal cross, placed by someone from Pa Lungan (its exact origins are murky), was dedicated to “God’s saving grace”; a sign commemorates the need to avoid bringing “anything detestable” into the land. Below, Pa Lungan seemed to float in an undulating sea of trees. 

That’s Indonesia, Walter said, pointing to the horizon. He added: “Other side of the mountain, they already logged.” He eyed the area behind the cross, toward another area that had already been logged. From this vantage, we could also see Pulong Tau. Walter hoped the park would last, that its boundaries would hold; not all government decisions do, he had told us earlier. 

Walter knew he was living in an Eden at risk, but has always said he will fight for it. “I’m the one who’s always fighting against this logging,” he told me in 2006. 

Today, he has more hope for this view, still intact. We peered across thick stands of trees where Walter had taken us foraging for edible palms and rattans, and bamboos with liquid inside. He said he could live in that forest on the food and drink it provided. It had, after all, sustained centuries of people before him. “That’s why we need to keep our jungle,” he said.

Bario, and most Kelabit villages, offer homestay lodging with meals included.

Jungle Blues Dream (junglebluesdream.weebly.com) charges 70 ringgit per person per day, about $21 at 3.25 ringgit to the dollar. The owners can help arrange guides (typically 80 to 100 ringgit a day) and lodging elsewhere. Prices for homestay lodgings generally range from 50 to 90 ringgit a day.

Several Pa Lungan villagers welcome guests, at similar rates, including Walter Paran; arrange in advance from Bario or simply show up.

A version of this article appears in print on February 23, 2014, on page TR8 of the New York edition with the headline: Back to Borneo, and an Eden at Risk. Order Reprints|Today's Paper|Subscribe

The Landscape of Memory Archaeology, oral history, and culture deep in the Malaysian jungle

http://www.archaeology.org/issues/127-1403/letter-from/1793-borneo-jungle-megalithic-mounds-stone-jars

By KAREN COATES

Monday, February 10, 2014

(Jerry Redfern) Henry Lagang is one of only 6,000 members of highland
Borneo’s Kelabit tribe. Each day, Henry Lagang heads into the forest to hunt
and forage with a machete slung over one shoulder, a gun over the other, and
dogs at his heels. His mother grows rice, and so do his neighbors. For generations,
people have lived and worked like this to claim the land—and survive—in the
inland jungles of Malaysian Borneo.

For centuries, the Kelabits, a small tribe of hunter-farmer-foragers, lived in near isolation in the Bornean forests that straddle Malaysia and Indonesia. The tribe practiced animism and headhunting until missionaries converted them to Christianity in the 1940s. In contrast to the wealth of archaeological and anthropological research on the inhabitants of the island’s coasts, very little is known about the early history of the peoples who dwelled in these highlands. With approximately 6,000 tribe members among a total population of roughly 20 million Borneans, the Kelabits are a tiny minority, and little has been published on their history. But archaeologists working there now may offer new insights into the missing pieces of Kelabit history, as well as that of their predecessors.

Until recently, this region of the island was accessible only by plane or a month-long hike through the jungle. A new dirt logging road now connects the interior and the coast, but the locals who choose to stay still hike far and wide for food. Their lives revolve around the jungle. Kelabits measure their treks in cigarette time, 47-year-old Lagang explains. For example, it’s a “two-cigarette” hike from his mother’s rice field to a recently abandoned longhouse known as Batu Patong, through bucolic fields flanked by thick rain forest resonating with the sounds of insects.

(Richard Bleiweiss)

As he heads toward the jungle, Lagang passes a stone mound where local stories say heirless ancestors buried their belongings. Just a few yards away, beside a neighbor’s pineapple garden, sits a broken ceramic jar in what remains of a cemetery. Beyond, the rain forest shelters thousands of years of the archaeological record stacked atop itself, layer upon layer, site upon site: century-old longhouses with fruit trees planted by previous inhabitants, 300- to 600-year-old stone burial jars covered in moss and caked in dirt, now-overgrown rice and sago plots that fed the highlanders up to 2,300 years ago, and even evidence of widespread forest burning, a potential sign of arboriculture, dating back 6,000 years or more. Archaeologists have no way yet to precisely identify many of the jungle’s past inhabitants or the creators of these sites. And the more scientists find, the more questions emerge about the histories that lie hidden.

Though the island of Borneo has 50,000 years of known human occupation, until recently very little excavation, or even survey, has taken place in the inland mountains. Now, research in the Kelabit jungles offers new possibilities for assembling the puzzle of human history across interior Borneo. Since 2007, Lindsay Lloyd-Smith of Sogang University’s Institute for East Asian Studies in Seoul, South Korea, has coordinated archaeological fieldwork for a multiyear, multidisciplinary research team called the Cultured Rainforest Project (CRF). Led by Cambridge archaeologist Graeme Barker, CRF includes scientists from universities and institutes across the United Kingdom, South Korea, and Malaysia, and combines work in the disciplines of archaeology, anthropology, and paleoecology. The project’s aim is to investigate past and present relationships between people and rain forest in interior highland Borneo. “We really didn’t know what to expect,” Lloyd-Smith says of the project’s beginnings. “We now have a pretty good chronological framework for human occupation and subsistence in the heart of Borneo, and it has revealed just how rich and varied the prehistory of central Borneo is. It’s exciting.” Yet the local knowledge of the past on which much of the CRF’s work also depends is slipping away quickly, and documentation of the archaeology might be one of the only ways to save it.

(Courtesy Lindsay Lloyd-Smith) Members of the Cultured Rainforest Project (CRF) 
are documenting the archaeological landscape of the Kelabit highlands, including this 
large stone mound known as a perupun. 

CRF’s work has also given Lagang and his neighbors their first formal chance to learn about Kelabit history, which is not taught in Malaysian schools. And the timing is critical. The last decade has brought rapid change as interior Borneo faces the rise of commercial logging and the cultural changes that come with it. Since 1990, according to a recent scientific report, logging has altered nearly 80 percent of Malaysian Borneo’s land surface. When trees go, so do traditional lifestyles that rely on them. Amid the effects of newly built logging roads, climate change, and a desire among young people for education and city jobs, Kelabit life seesaws between tradition and transition. Fading cultural knowledge compounds the threats to potential archaeological sites from the harsh climate and farmland development, explains Borbála Nyíri, who is Lloyd-Smith’s partner in both life and work, and a doctoral student at the School of Archaeology and Ancient History at the University of Leicester. “Many sites are now only known to a handful of old people, and are quickly dropping out of the sphere of cultural memory,” Nyíri says.

Through the years, Lagang and his mother, Mariar Aran, have opened the doors of their longhouse to researchers—“many people, many times,” Lagang says—offering beds and mosquito nets, meals of homegrown rice, wild boar and deer he has hunted, and vegetables plucked from the jungle. Lagang serves as both host and guide through the tangled terrain.

The Kelabit highlands are dotted with signs of the past. Throughout the forest, there are hundreds of markers called etuu. The Kelabits believe that in order to establish rights over a landscape, it is essential to mark it. These markers can include megaliths, carved stones, stone jars, stone mounds, and even rice fields. One prominent type of mark is the large stone mound known as a perupun. Kelabits today say such mounds, which are found all across the central highlands and can reach 100 feet wide and 10 feet high, were spiritually significant. “These findings seem to indicate a widespread cultural tradition that flourished around 2,000 years ago, during the Early Metal Age,” Lloyd-Smith says. And they indicate use of the landscape going back generations.

(Jerry Redfern) Kelabit tribesman Walter Paran stands in front of a megalithic burial site—
one of the many types of man-made marks on the landscape—called Batu Ritong.

Kelabits also see etuu as evidence of a person’s ability to channel lalud, the manifest power believed to govern all nature, from rivers to rain to life itself. Lalud is deeply intertwined with the spirit world, and etuu are indicators of a person’s ties to those spirits and ancestors. According to CRF anthropologist Monica Janowski, “A successful human, of high status, should demonstrate the ability to manage and manipulate lalud effectively, and this should be visible through the etuu marks he or she makes on the landscape.”

Etuu aren’t the only signs of human occupation in the forest. There are also hundreds of old settlements in varying stages of decay. Some are standing wooden structures, such as Batu Patong, while others are recognizable only by fruits and palms planted by previous inhabitants. Some sites date to the 1800s, and locals can remember their names and histories. Others show evidence of occupation dating back 400 years, but nothing is known of the people who lived there. Researchers have also identified what appear to be large, open-air settlements with stone walls and iron artifacts dating to the Early Metal Age, some 1,000 to 2,300 years ago. “As far as I am aware, these represent the earliest Metal Age settlements yet discovered on Borneo,” Lloyd-Smith says. Cave burial sites on the island have been studied before, but much less is known about occupation sites. For the first time, Lloyd-Smith says, he and his colleagues can begin to see these early societies from a domestic perspective, rather than from their mortuary practices alone. But at this point, the researchers don’t know a lot about these sites, such as whether they were long-term villages or gathering points for multiple communities, or how iron tools were introduced, or who brought them.

(Courtesy Lindsay Lloyd-Smith, Jerry Redfern) CRF archaeologists excavate at 
Long Diit (above left), which was used as a settlement as far back as 2,400 years 
ago, then as a burial site, likely 300-600 years ago. One of the 14 stone jars (above 
right) found at the site is heavily overgrown but still stands. 

The evidence uncovered thus far provokes questions about who the jungle’s early inhabitants were, how they lived and worked, what they ate, and how they interacted with their regional neighbors at a time of thriving trade between Borneo, China, India, and Southeast Asia. Were the early inhabitants of interior Borneo indigenous to the highlands, or outsiders who came with iron tools? Were they among the first Neolithic farmers who arrived in Southeast Asia from Taiwan and the Philippines 1,000 years earlier? Or was this interior culture a mix of local development and regional migration?

These queries have led Lloyd-Smith on a new investigation, called the Early Borneo Project. He hopes to focus on the early relationships between Borneo’s highlands and coast, and on the question of whether regional trade could have sparked the construction of megaliths and monuments such as the perupuns in the heart of Borneo in the Early Metal Age. “The effect of such early ‘globalization’ on such distant interior locations has never been considered,” says Lloyd-Smith.

For outsiders, traveling through the Bornean jungle is a constant challenge of balance, strength, and determination. But Lagang knows this place, how it behaves, and how he must respond. Even fording rivers is routine for him. He braces his body against the forceful flow of cold water rushing over rocks. Once across the water, he bushwhacks through vines and leaves, clearing a path to Long Diit, a site that was a settlement 1,000 to 2,400 years ago, and was later used as a cemetery, or menatoh, likely beginning 300 to 600 years ago. Menatoh are found throughout the highlands. These were essentially “villages of the dead,” according to Janowski. There, the deceased continue to live in the parallel spirit world or dimension, growing rice, keeping chickens, and practicing other everyday activities.

(Jerry Redfern) A broken dragon jar at the edge of Lagang’s village of Pa Dalih is the only surviving vessel in what was once a cemetery filled with dragon jars.

 

At Long Diit, beneath the towering canopy of old-growth forest, are seven slab structures and 14 moss-covered stone burial jars, some standing, some fallen, some broken. The intact jars are the size of a small, slim person. The area was used as a burial ground before the Christian conversion, Lagang says. Pointing to a giant tree with gnarled roots, he recalls the skulls—“a lot of them”—that used to sit at its base when he was a child. Wherever you see this type of tree, he says, ancestral remains may lie beneath.

Stories like Lagang’s are critical to understanding the region. Sometimes, local legends are the very foundation from which researchers work.

Another type of historical evidence, large glazed stoneware storage jars, were likely first produced in China in the seventh through tenth centuries, and became highly prized trade items in Borneo, according to Nyíri. In the Kelabit highlands, these jars—known as dragon jars for the designs that typically adorn their sides—were keepsakes, or were used for rice or wine. Others were used for storing the bones of the dead in pre-Christian cemeteries. “Dragon jars became treasured heirloom pieces passed down for generations,” Nyíri says. Only the wealthy upper classes owned them, and some Kelabit elders still keep these jars in their homes. “They put rice inside,” says a 43-year-old villager named Walter Paran, describing the jar his family bought, long before he was born, from traders across the border in Kalimantan for the price of two buffalo.

Today Paran takes care of several jars that his uncle, now deceased, kept in his house. His living relatives don’t know much about them, their origins, or their value. “We forgot to ask,” he says. “That’s a big mistake for us. That is why we are losing our history …that’s why our children, they don’t know.” He’s happy the CRF team is taking notes and recording data. Paran, like many elders, says Kelabit history is fading from memory. His nine-year-old daughter, Mujan, and her peers trek five hours to the town of Bario, where they attend boarding school. In class, they learn nothing about the Kelabit culture. “They teach history,” Paran says, “but not this type of history.”

When Lagang was a child, several dragon jars sat at the edge of his village, right above a river. Only the pieces of only one remain today. He recalls that when he was a young boy, he approached that place with caution because the jars held spirits that sometimes spoke—a story repeated by Kelabit elders across the highlands. “Ting, ting, ting … whoo whoo,” he mimics the voices. When he heard that, he ran away fast, he says. It’s been a long time since the spirits have spoken to Lagang.

(Jerry Redfern) Paran is the caretaker for an imported Chinese dragon jar that has been in his 
family for generations. 

Both Kelabit villagers and CRF researchers hope their collaboration can help fill the knowledge gap. “We have always been warmly welcomed, looked after, and supported, even adopted,” says Nyíri. She feels a responsibility in return, and a duty to inform. “We hear complaints that researchers collect data, publish it, and make a career out of a few months’ work,” without sharing their findings with local communities, she says. To remedy that, the archaeologists have exhibited their findings, tools, and future research plans for local audiences. The CRF has published annual reports in the Sarawak Museum Journal and distributed project pamphlets throughout the highlands. “It’s only ethical and fair to share even preliminary results with the local community,” Nyíri says.

(Jerry Redfern)

Brochures about CRF’s work have a place of honor in the guesthouse run by Henry Lagang.

 
It’s also what locals crave. “I’ve been interviewed many, many times, but I haven’t seen the results before,” says an elder named Jenette Ulun, who is active in Kelabit festivals and whose name often appears on travel blogs as an authority on Kelabit cultural traditions. “It’s good to finally know the results,” says Ulun. “It’s not only for us to see. Now our children can see this is what’s done for the Kelabits, for our people, and understand our culture and know what their parents, their grandparents, their great-grandparents did. Otherwise there is no written record.”

That record is critical in the fight to preserve local heritage. “‘Rural development’ is the buzz phrase in Sarawak these days,” says Lloyd-Smith. The term encompasses everything from palm oil and rubber plantations that replace rain forests after logging, to agricultural projects and homestay tourism. “Within such an environment,” he says, “only by the community realizing the cultural value of their archaeology, and being proud of how important it is for Borneo and the whole of Southeast Asia, can the protection of the cultural heritage of the Kelabit highlands be safeguarded. Archaeology can play a large role in this.”

One day, Lagang stands atop a perupun just a few hundred yards from his longhouse. From this vantage point, he looks to the past. “Before, when I was small, this was all jungle,” he says, gazing at his neighbors’ homes and vegetable gardens. Lagang used to hunt birds with his blowpipe right around here. Life was a bit different then. More people lived in the longhouse, gathering in the evenings and early mornings around smoky open fires in the communal hallway that traditionally connected one Kelabit family to dozens of others. It was a close, collective existence. But these days, many permanent village residents opt for individual family homes. Modern houses with metal roofs have sprung up around the perupun where Lagang used to hunt. Rice paddies and gardens sit where trees once stood. Though jungle still surrounds the village, times have changed, and so has Kelabit culture.

(Jerry Redfern) One of Lagang’s hunting dogs sits by several toppled stone jars at Long Diit.

At sunset, Lagang works in the longhouse kitchen, preparing a dinner of paddy rice, fried pork fat, bamboo shoots, and mouse deer soup—all harvested from the forests that feed him every day, the same forests that fed millennia of highlanders. That evening, he shows snapshots of the researchers who have stayed with him through the years. When dinner is finished and the dishes are cleaned, Lagang sits alone beside the open-hearth fire, staring into the night. It’s Sunday, the last evening of a weeklong holiday. Almost all the young adults have returned to school and work in the city. Just a few elders sit and chat on the wobbly wooden floor planks, 300 feet away from Lagang, at the end of the longhouse. The lights are out, and the lengthy common corridor ends in blackness. How long will this longhouse last? How long will the Kelabit forest and the archaeological sites within it endure? Will the Kelabits have a chance to learn their own history before it disappears? Ties to the ancestral past, imprinted in stone and carved into the land, still bind the Kelabits today. The perupun Lagang remembers as a child remains intact, undisturbed. He’s happy the archaeologists are studying it. “They write the story about the Kelabit people. They can protect the megaliths, the culture,” he says. “Good.”

Karen Coates is a Social Justice Reporting Fellow at the International Center for Journalists and a senior fellow at the Schuster Institute for Investigative Journalism.

Bario rice enjoying new lease of life

http://www.theborneopost.com/2013/10/06/bario-rice-enjoying-new-lease-of-life/

by Samuel Aubrey, reporters@theborneopost.com. 

Posted on October 6, 2013, Sunday

THERE IS HOPE: A rainbow over a rice field in Bario.

KUCHING: The Bario Paddy Development Project has helped open up more areas with Bario rice in the Kelabit Highlands.

At present, more than half of the project area is well irrigated and padi has been growing for nearly two months, said Thomas Hii, managing director of Bario Ceria Sdn Bhd – the joint venture company undertaking the project.

He added that the project was almost 90 per cent completed, and the total area of padi field already planted is 145 hectares, which is larger than the area ever planted over the last 10 years.

The only shortcoming, he lamented, was insufficient quality seeds for good quality crop to make this project benefit the farmers more.

“Before this, Bario padi planting was in the downward slide, with more and more padi fields being deserted year after year. Before this project started, less than 60 hectares remained cultivated. With this project, it is obvious that we are seeing ‘life’ being re-ignited in the Bario (Kelabit) Highlands,” he said yesterday.

Hii was responding to The Borneo Post’s Oct 4 report where it was alleged that the harvest of Bario rice, rated as best in the region and is rich in minerals and vitamins, is expected to be poor this year due to delay in completing the irrigation system.

Bario Ceria is a joint venture between Ceria Alliance Group and Rurum Kelabit Sarawak to undertake the ‘National Key Economic Area (NKEA) Bario Paddy Development Project’ at a cost of RM17 million.

The project, Hii said, was initiated by and fully supported by the Bario community, especially the farmers. The community appreciates the government’s commitment to help them restore abandoned rice farms and to help increase the farmer’s yield and income.

The project includes the construction of seven irrigation dams with irrigation pipes to the fields, construction of farm roads, levelling of rice fields, ploughing, planting and harvesting services for 200 hectares of padi land in Bario, and the construction of a drying and milling factory.

“The drying and milling factory located not far from the project site is complete with modern drying and milling equipment of a capacity of 20 tonnes per day of drying facility.

“This factory has been rushed for completion as well as commissioned with power for the sole purpose of accommodating the large quantity of padi expected to be harvested this coming season.”

Hii admitted there were problems with the delivery of water to irrigate some of the rice fields, but Bario Ceria should not be faulted for this problem.

He said the existing irrigation system that should continue to irrigate the padi fields had not been well maintained, and it was unable to irrigate all the fields as mentioned in the Oct 4 news report.

It was further compounded by the farmers’ assumption that the new irrigation system being built by Bario Ceria would be completed in time for this year’s planting season, which started in August.

“The new irrigation system built by Bario Ceria Sdn Bhd is ready for more than 70 per cent of the total project area, and the contractual completion date is December 2013.

“The maintenance of the existing/old irrigation system is not within Bario Ceria Sdn Bhd’s contract scope, but we did help to repair two of the existing/old dams. All the seven irrigation dams and the installation of the irrigation pipes are progressing on target to deliver water to the whole project area by December 2013.

Hii said Bario Ceria would continue to do its best to assist the farmers, including providing water pumps to pump water into those rice fields that are not adequately operated.

“However, we need the farmers’ co-operation to inform our site office, bring our men to the site, and to oversee the pumping operations in their affected rice fields. We have five 6” water pumps on standby in Bario to assist the farmers.”

Hii added that Bario Ceria had been working non-stop to address issues highlighted by the farmers in relation to the project, and would continue to work closely with the local community leaders and block leaders, who are appointed by the farmers from among their group.

“Bario Ceria is a joint venture entity, so our partnership is for the long term. It will not end just because construction had been completed. That, we believe, will make us more unique than all previous projects implemented by government in this highland areas (sic).”

Delay in completing irrigation system spells doom for Bario rice farmers

http://www.theborneopost.com/2013/10/04/delay-in-completing-irrigation-system-spells-doom-for-bario-rice-farmers/

Posted on October 4, 2013, Friday

KUCHING: The harvest of Sarawak’s premium Bario rice, rated as the best in the region and rich in minerals and vitamins, is expected to be poor this year.

This was expressed by Rurum Kelabit Sarawak vice president Dr Roland Mattu on his return from a recent visit home in Bario.

He said this was because there is no irrigation for the padi field and farmers are relying on rain water only, but with very little rain in the last month of September.

He pointed out the problem came after an agricultural development contractor was given the contract by the government to provide for irrigation.

This resulted in the traditional farm dams being abandoned in anticipation of the new pipe irrigation under construction. Unfortunately, technical problems arose and as yet there is no irrigation which means the lack of running water and this is going to lead to a poor harvest, he lamented.

“I have been following the farming for many decades as my parent have been farmers, I have never been more concerned about a seasonal failure than this year.

“Many of the farms that have not been planted and those planted are without water and all are doomed to failure. There is urgent need for action and farmers are at a loss as where to turn. There is a chance of salvaging some of the farms but this will need immediate action to get water onto the paddy field in Paramapuh, Maraiw, Arur Laab, and Arur Dalan,” he said yesterday.

He also said he has met Pemanca Philip Lakai who has highlighted the problem to the authority concerned but who also now feels helpless.

“One of the most important part of Bario Rice cultivation is to have abundant fresh water from the mountain (flow) into the bunds especially after the planting season (but) as this is not happening, the planted fields for harvest is doomed to fail.

“There is an urgent need for corrective action and on behalf of all of the farmers in Bario. As vice president of Rurum Kelabit Sarawak, I appeal to all concerned for your help,” he pleaded.

On behalf of the Bario Asal farmers, he said they are all looking forward for the new irrigation and mechanised farming as the way forward but the delay is making them very anxious.

“Our ancestors have been cultivating wet padi for generations, surely some of what we have been practising is of great value rather than a revolution with modern methods.

“There should be a careful conservation of our farming methods that are good and merge with modern methods to take it to greater heights. The irrigation may take another year to complete and we cannot afford to have poor harvest two years in a row,” he said.

Based on news reports, RM17 million was allocated for the Bario Rice Industry Development Project under the National Key Result Areas (NKRA) in January 2012.

Deputy Chief Minister Datuk Patinggi Tan Sri Alfred Jabu was quoted as saying the implementation of the project, between 2011 and 2015, involving 800 hectares of highland in the Bario area, had been offered to Syarikat Bario Ceria Sdn Bhd.

Sarawak pays price of 'third world maintenance'

http://www.malaysiakini.com/news/242094

25.09.13

By Dukau Papau

Several water treatment plants and windmills in rural Sarawak are “not functioning”, according to state PKR head Baru Bian, who wants the government and Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) to step in.

The projects, which have cost millions of ringgit to build, install and operate, are under the Rural and Regional Development Ministry.

Bian cited the example of a water treatment plant in his constituency of Ba’Kelalan in Lawas, which had cost the government more than RM3 million to build.

“The plant is (meant) to pump water from Sungai Muda into tanks where it is then filtered to supply clean water to the Budur Nur village of more than 70 households. But untreated and murky water has (been) supplied to the households.

“Now there is no money to buy diesel - costing about RM1,000 a month - to run the plant, which is not maintained at all. I’m told there are a few of these in Sarawak, and there are similar problems at each.”

Bian also highlighted the case of windmills, including three in Bario, which are not working and therefore unable to generate electricity for villages.

“Each windmill is worth RM6 million. Imagine, these were constructed at the foot of a hill where there is no wind ... one has (even toppled over),” he said, noting that windmills in other countries are either located on a hilltop or in an open area.

“The construction of (all) these projects (in Sarawak) is a clear waste of public funds. The amount spent could well run over RM100 million.

“This money should have been used to repair schools or teachers’ quarters in my constituency that are badly in need of repair.

“In one primary school in my constituency, the teachers and parents came up with their own money to repair the teachers’ quarters, as their request for funds was not met.”

Bian said he believes the projects were implemented to pacify the rakyat who have been angry that they have been neglected.

“This tactic was done during election time,” he said, accusing the BN government of wasting public funds as well as “cheating the people”.

Curtin, eBario, association ink MoU

http://www.theborneopost.com/2013/09/07/curtin-ebario-association-ink-mou/

Posted on September 7, 2013, Saturday

MIRI: Curtin Sarawak is extending its expertise in the development of student learning activities, training, research and collaborative projects with eBario Sendirian Berhad and Rurum Kelabit Sarawak.

A memorandum of understanding (MoU) on the project was signed recently between eBario chief executive officer Councillor John Tarawe, Laila Raja for Rurum Kelabit and outgoing Curtin Sarawak pro vice-chancellor Professor Ian Kerr.

Present to witness the signing were incoming pro vice-chancellor Professor Jim Mienczakowski, Curtin Sarawak Research Institute (CSRI) director Professor Aaron Goh, CSRI senior research fellow Dr Lisa Marie King and Supang Terawe of Rurum Kelabit Sarawak.

Mienczakowski said the MoU marked an important milestone for Curtin Sarawak and demonstrated its commitment to engage with local communities in its pursuit of academic excellence.

King, who was instrumental in establishing the cooperative relationship between the different parties, echoed Mienczakowki’s sentiments.

“As a member of CSRI, I am keen to apply my knowledge and expertise to enhance the well-being of communities in Sarawak. Our close engagement with eBario and Rurum Kelabit Sarawak will lead to significant activities and joint projects that can have a positive impact, both on the university’s learning experiences and the communities,” she said.

eBario Sdn Bhd is an award-winning initiative that runs projects and activities such as the eBario Telecentre, eBario Innovation Village, Radio Bario, eBario Knowledge Fair, Bario Slow Food Festival and eBorneo Research.

Remote communities now into high-yielding rubber planting

http://www.theborneopost.com/2013/08/16/remote-communities-now-into-high-yielding-rubber-planting/

by Karen Bong, reporters@theborneopost.com. Posted on August 16, 2013, Friday

KUCHING: The Penan and Kelabit communities in the most remote settlements in Baram have already started with the planting of high-yielding rubber.

This was disclosed by Modernisation of Agriculture Minister Datuk Patinggi Tan Sri Dr Alfred Jabu yesterday, who also said a total of 72 Penan families in Long Beruang and 60 Kelabit families in Long Peluan participated in the scheme on 520 hectares of land. Jabu, who is also Rural Development Minister, pointed out that the project is part of the state government’s Rural Transformation Programme to eradicate poverty.

“The government’s aim is to help lift people out of poverty, especially those in the remotest interior of Sarawak, through agriculture,” he added.

Jabu was at the Kuching Borneo Convention Centre (BCCK) here to open the Sarawak Land Consolidation and Rehabilitation Authority (Salcra) Farm Development Committee Members Seminar.

“Backed by biotechnology advancement, we have now started planting the high quality rubber trees,” he said.

“We hope that the participants can generate sustainable income through the rubber plantation after four years (maturity). It is hoped that they can earn at least RM2,000 per month per family once the rubber trees reach maturity for tapping,” he emphasised. The project, introduced early last year, was launched by Deputy Prime Minister Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin.

The first phase of the project involved the clearing of land, building of infrastructure such as road to the estate and nursery for rubber saplings, followed by planting.

As rural development minister, Jabu said he would not be deterred by the unique challenges and difficulties faced in the rural interiors.

“Understandably, Baram located about 15 hours drive from Miri in good weather, is hardly accessible but despite the difficulties, I still choose to start the project,” he said. Thus, Jabu hopes that the participants can see the fruits of their hard work after four or five years and in turn change their negative perception of the Barisan Nasional (BN) government.

“We hope to give the opportunities to the nomadic Penans, especially those who have been negatively influenced by certain non-governmental organisations (NGOs), to see the commitment of the BN government,” he said.

Proposed township to benefit Telang Usan — Rep

http://www.theborneopost.com/2013/08/15/proposed-township-to-benefit-telang-usan-rep/

Posted on August 15, 2013, Thursday

MIRI: The proposed Baram Hydroelectric Project (HEP) new township will bring many benefits to the Telang Usan constituency such as increasing the people’s standard of living.

Telang Usan assemblyman Dennis Ngau told The Borneo Post yesterday that the plan showed the government’s willingness and effort to develop and transform Baram into a better and more developed constituency by 2020.

“Personally, I agree with the proposal to turn this constituency into a modern one, while still reflecting the culture and traditions of the multi-ethnic people living in Baram.

“The people must understand that the proposed Telang Usan new township will also become a boost for tourism that surely will improve the livelihoods of the people in Baram,” he said.

Dennis pointed out that many members of the Orang Ulu community from Ulu Baram have achieved success in life, but did not return to the longhouses and contribute to the community.

“If this Telang Usan new township is built one day, it will also open many doors for job opportunities for these young people to go back to their roots and contribute something to the people and our country’s economic growth,” he said.

He urged Baram folk, especially the younger generation, to look at the positive side of the proposal which would benefit them and their families.

“Many opportunities will be given to them, especially job opportunities such as in the tourism industry,” he added.

On Tuesday, Chief Minister Pehin Sri Abdul Taib Mahmud said the proposed township would have elements reflecting the rich history of the Kayans, Kenyahs and Kelabits, who migrated from East Java to Batang Kayan in Indonesia before settling in Kapit and Baram.

Tribute to a Kelabit paramount chief

http://www.theborneopost.com/2013/07/20/tribute-to-a-kelabit-paramount-chief/

by Lucy Bulan. Posted on July 20, 2013, Saturday

DEEPLY ROOTED: A family portrait.

Ngimat Ayu

A PIONEER, innovator and paramount chief of the Kelabits, Ngimat Ayu passed away on July 18, 2013 at the age of 92, leaving a legacy of immense love and kindness, outstanding leadership and tremendous wisdom.

Surrounded by his wife, children and grandchildren as he breathed his last, Ngimat Ayu was one Kelabit who had lived a full life and stood tall and strong amongst all odds.

As news of his passing began to reach people, especially Kelabits in Malaysia and those living in other parts of the world, condolence messages began pouring in to his immediate family members and relatives.

Many recalled fond memories of Ngimat Ayu and how much he will be missed.

Indeed, this man whom his grandchildren call a legend had left a lasting impression on everyone – young and old – who were fortunate to have met him.


Family history


Born on July 15, 1921 in Pa’ Main, Bario in the Kelabit highlands, Ngimat Ayu, whose given name was Gerawat Aran, was one of four children of Tagung Aran @ Ngemung Sakai and Sineh Tagung Aran.

His siblings were Lu’ui, Muda and Dayang (Tepuh Luyuq dedtur). Because he was quite sickly as a child, and according to Kelabit custom of meman anak, Gerawat was adopted and brought up by his uncle (his father’s youngest brother) Tekapen Raja and Edteh Kedieh Aran.

In 1955, he married Martha Padan from Long Pupung, Kerayan. In those days, he was one of the rare ones to get a bride from Kerayan, Kalimantan, a marriage arranged by their relatives. And as is the Kerayan custom, he had to pay a huge dowry for this beautiful, hardworking maiden of noble ancestry.

They were blessed with seven children – Abel, Anne, Felicity Ruran, Linda, Evelyn, Nancy Daun, and Scott Apoi. They became adoptive parents to three children of Gerawat’s sister and brother-in-law Tepuh Luyuq, both of whom had died early from sickness – Datin Sri Mariam Balan, Maria Peter Lu’ui and the late Tony Ngimat Ayu.

Following the birth of his eldest child, Abel Ngimat, Gerawat changed his name to Ngimat Ayu according to Kelabit tradition. Then on the birth of his first grandchild, Stephen Baya Peter (the son of Maria Peter Lu’ui), Ngimat Ayu changed his name to Belaan Tauh.

Meantime, Ngimat Ayu had adopted five other children. Today, he has 31 grandchildren and 18 great grandchildren.

Before going to school, young Ngimat Ayu (known then by his given name Gerawat) worked with the Allied Forces in the Japanese Resistance Army.

He remembered being in Ba’Kelalan and Belawit when the Japanese surrendered, and helped the Allied Forces to escort the Japanese out of Belawit.

He also fearlessly assisted Major Tom Harrison to fish out the Penan and the Iban from Indonesia who were believed to have murdered Hardin, the Resident of Marudi at the end of 1945.

Gerawat attended the first school set up by Major Tom Harrison in Pa’ Main Longhouse at the age of 24.

“Many parents were reluctant to allow their children to go to school,” he said.

“They insisted that they themselves had done very well without schooling —why waste time in school?”

But young Gerawat’s father was one of the chiefs responsible for the introduction of the first school in the community, so Gerawat became one of the first of 19 students to attend school when the school first opened in 1946.

The school Tom Harrison started had one teacher, Paul Kohuan from East Timor.

He taught Gerawat until Primary Four in Pa’ Main School, after which Tom Harrison brought Gerawat to Kuching to work in the Sarawak Museum.

His job was to collect and record artifacts for the Museum.

While working, he continued his Primary Five and Six education in Merpati Jepang through night studies.

Young Gerawat and his peers went to school with one vision in mind: to return to the Kelabit Highlands and serve the community (nuuh bawang), and to uplift their living condition.

So on completion of his primary school education, Tom Harrison told Gerawat he was to go into the medical line as there were enough Kelabit teachers already.

He acquiesced without question.


The medical assistant-dresser


Gerawat started his training as a medical assistant (then called dresser) in Kuching in 1951, and was the first Orang Ulu to be trained as a dresser.

“When I began my practical training in Kuching, I still had my Orang Ulu haircut and elongated earlobes, and the patients always asked to see the medical assistant, not knowing I was the one.

“I always told them ‘he is inside his room’ but treated them myself and only referred complicated cases to the senior medical officer,” he said.

Gerawat’s training was so comprehensive that he knew how to stitch wounds, conduct simple surgery like cutting off elongated earlobes, treat leprosy, pull out teeth, order and disburse medication and even deliver babies.

On his initial return to the Kelabit Highlands, Gerawat was accompanied and introduced as a dresser by SAO Kusil Tingang and Tom Harrison.

He was based in Pa’ Main, but made regular monthly trips to each outstation village in the highlands — from Long Banga in the south to all the villages in the Kelapang and Debpur basin, and to Kuba’an, Long Lellang and Seridan villages.

Even after being joined by other dressers later, he continued to be the travelling ‘medicine man’ for years, organising groups of porters from each village in making monthly trips to Lio Mattu to collect and carry medicine sent from Marudi for him to disburse.

He came up with the idea of using used cooking oil tins as storage containers for his medicine.

He stored them at each village so that he could reduce the number of porters to go around with him.

“I worked alone as the only dresser in the highlands for years. I never ran out of medicine. I made sure there was regular supply all the time even though transportation was very difficult.

“Everything had to be transported by boat from Marudi to Lio Mattu, and by land from thence to Bario. Today, you people have aeroplanes and helicopters to carry medicine to Bario, and you still have not enough stock of medicine! I cannot understand this,” he lamented.

Gerawat @ Ngimat Ayu served as ulu dresser altogether for 15 years (1951-65).

The effectiveness of his service, assisted afterwards by other health assistants, can be seen from the rapid disappearance of leprosy, skin diseases, malaria and fatal epidemics (kedta in Kelabit) that had plagued the Kelabits for generations and almost wiped out the tribe at one point.

One of his achievements had been to inculcate clean habits among the people.

“I got people to drink only boiled water and remove their livestock from under their longhouses and to disallow dogs from living together in the longhouses. I faced a great deal of opposition especially in this but with support from Tom Harrison and the missionaries, we succeeded in changing peoples’ lifestyles,” he said.


The paramount chief


In 1965, Tom Harrison arranged for an election of a new Penghulu to replace the then Penghulu Lawai Besara.

Four contestants stood for the post (Inan Mulun, Ulit Mattu, Galih Balang, and Ngimat Ayu) and Ngimat Ayu was elected.

He had to quit his post as medical assistant and thence began his long history as the paramount chief of the Kelabit.

Ngimat Ayu served as the only Kelabit Penghulu from 1966-1997.

And then in 1998, the government decided to appoint a Pemanca as the new paramount chief of the Kelabit.

Penghulu Ngimat Ayu was appointed and he served as Pemanca until 2005 with three new Penghulus as his assistants: Henry Jalla of Bario, Tulu Ayu of Long Seridan, and Gan Tuloi of Long Peluan. Ngimat Ayu was a visionary and an innovator.

During his tenure as the paramount chief, he witnessed the opening up of Bario Lem Baaq to rapid development, including the Codification of the Kelabit Customary Laws (the Adet Kelabit 2008), the building of an all-weather-airport, the introduction of ICT through e-Bario, the building of the inter village road within Bario and the road connecting Bario to the outside world, to name a few.

He strongly supported the idea of Bario Ceria and the provision of power supply through the solar farm in Bario, especially after the failed hydro-hybrid project.

His magnificent art of negotiation, extraordinary hospitality to guests and locals alike and his tremendous leadership skills have enabled him to gain much favour from people in authority on behalf of the Kelabit community.

His special ability to identify with young and old, educated and uneducated, strangers and family alike has endeared him to a multitude of people, making him easily approachable and loveable.

As far as he was able and available, he visited every sick person he knew, went to every funeral, attended every wedding he was invited to and was able to laugh and cry with people he knew.

In a nutshell, Ngimat Ayu made time for everyone.


Straddling two worlds


Ngimat Ayu has straddled many eras and was a pioneer in many fields.

He served as the first Orang Ulu medical assistant (ulu dresser) from 1951-65 and left his job to become the first elected Penghulu of the Kelabit from 1966-97.

He was then promoted to become the first Kelabit Pemanca from 1998-2005.

Ngimat Ayu was born (in 1921) before the Japanese Occupation and before the impact of the rule of the White Rajah had been fully felt by the Kelabit.

He had personally experienced the hardship under the old way of life but understood the value systems, the customs and traditions that gave the Kelabit their identity.

He lived through and fought during the Japanese Occupation and helped bridge the gap between our Indonesian neighbours and our people after the Indonesian-Malaysian Confrontation in the 1960’s.

He embraced Christianity as a first generation Christian in the highlands and witnessed the extraordinary impact their faith had on the Kelabit community.

He participated in the resettlement exercise whereby the neighbouring villages were relocated to Bario Lem Baaq during the Confrontation.

Thus, he experienced the hard work and excitement of opening up new horizons and fresh boundaries as well as the pain and loss of leaving the familiar.

As Penghulu, he was instrumental in settling many legal issues related to this relocation exercise in a peaceful manner.

Ngimat Ayu was a student pioneer of the first school in the Kelabit Highlands, and lived to see even his grandchildren finish university education.

He saw the schools in the Kelabit Highlands grow from the first primary school to lower secondary school level.

Before he died, he said: “My dream and vision is to see the secondary school in Bario reaching Form 5 level so that more students can reach Form 5 level instead of dropping out of school. Please don’t give up on the vision.”

Ngimat Ayu is one Kelabit man who has lived a full life, faced countless challenges and still stood tall and strong against all odds.

Clothed with God’s full armour, he was able, having done everything, to stand (Eph 6:13).

He leaves behind a legacy of immense love and kindness, outstanding leadership, and tremendous wisdom.

He is greatly missed by family, friends, the whole Kelabit community and all who knew him.

Farewell our father, cousin, uncle, grandfather. Rest in Peace. Until we meet again.

Wired to the world

http://www.thestar.com.my/Lifestyle/Features/2013/04/22/Wired-to-the-world.aspx

Published: Monday April 22, 2013 MYT 12:00:00 AM
Updated: Friday April 26, 2013 MYT 12:30:24 AM

Spark! by ALVIN UNG

Aishah working on her blog. The Internet has given her new opportunities for growth.

The amazing untold story of how broadband was made accessible to rural Malaysia, thanks largely to the initiative of a quiet man with a big vision.

ONE hot afternoon in March, I bought a woollen hat woven by a young woman living in Felda Jengka 24, an oil palm plantation in the heart of Pahang.

The brown-and-yellow hat was adorned with a three-dimensional white flower. Aishah took eight hours to crochet the hat. It was for sale for RM18.

“Can I buy this hat online?” I asked, as we chatted at a rural broadband Internet centre which began as a Pusat Internet Desa, or PID.

“Yes, I’m on Facebook,” said Aishah, smiling shyly, as she sat on a tall chair. “Just let me know the size, colours, and how many flowers you want on the hat. You can also contact me on Yahoo Messenger.”

I fished out two red notes from my wallet. I wasn’t sure how to hand her the money.

“Thank you for buying the hat,” Aishah said in Bahasa Malaysia, as she raised her leg high. She took the two bills from me using her big toe and second toe.

Nur Aishah Ariffin, 26, the youngest in a family of six children, was born with stumps instead of arms. The school teachers did not allow her to enrol in school, so she stayed at home watching television everyday until she turned 18, when she joined a community centre. She taught herself how to crochet. Using her feet, she used scissors to snip yarn, wrapped the yarn around the crochet hook, and began pulling loops. She made beautiful hats and bags.

But what use was it to sell a woollen hat in the middle of an oil palm plantation? Who would buy Aishah’s foot-made products? How would this motivated, bright young woman find opportunities for growth and learning?

Aishah’s story of untapped potential could be repeated thousands of times in rural households all across the country. Even for people who do not face the daily challenge of living without hands and arms, the rural poor face other kinds of invisible disabilities. For example, they spend far more time and money to do the things city folk take for granted, whether it is reading the news, writing an e-mail, or applying for entrance into universities.

The Internet is the great leveller. Global research has shown that the rollout of Internet services in rural communities can reduce urban migration while generating new income and home businesses in villages.

Getting there has been a challenge for Malaysia. Less than 15 years ago, Internet penetration in the country was less than 10%. None of the primary or secondary schools were wired to the Internet.

Access in rural areas was zilch. Most villagers had not seen a computer.

Since then Malaysia has been playing catch-up. The biggest game changer is the Communications Multimedia Act (CMA 1998) introduced as one of the Bills of Guarantee for the Multimedia Super Corridoor (MSC). This Act encourages the building of civil society. Less known, but equally important, is one of the 10 objectives: “to ensure an equitable provision of affordable services over ubiquitous national infrastructure.” In other words, rural folks should also get access to affordable Internet technology.

But creating sound policy and passing laws is only the first mile in a marathon. It is the ability to implement simple, scalable and sustainable solutions that will ensure whether the change effort endures or withers away.

Therein comes the rub: It is not in the interest of private telecommunications to spend billions to lay out broadband for so few people across jungles, rivers and mountains. And even after you build Internet centres in villages, it is an even bigger challenge to educate the people to use the Net.

Last month, a Felda settler and village chief told me that when he first sighted a desktop PC, he grabbed the mouse by its “tail” and swung it like a lasso.

So who were the people who helped to build the foundation for rural broadband access in Malaysia? And years later, has that made a difference?

“Dr Halim is the man you’re looking for,” declared Dr Fadhlullah Suhaimi Abdul Malek, the NKEA director at Pemandu. “He’s the spark who made broadband accessible in the rural setting. During a time when broadband was not available, he was persistent in pushing for the idea. He convinced the telcos to join in. And he always went down to the ground to make sure things were happening. It’s an amazing, untold story.”

A few weeks later, I found myself sitting in a Proton Perdana with Datuk Seri Dr Halim Shafie, the chairman of Telekom Malaysia (TM), as we drove along the Karak Highway to visit a community broadband centre in Jengka, a two hours’ drive from Kuala Lumpur.

In 1999, when Halim was appointed as deputy secretary-general of the Ministry of Energy, Water and Communications, there was no broadband outside the city. Today there are hundreds of rural broadband centres. More than a hundred are being set up this year. All 10,000 schools and hundreds of rural libraries are broadband-enabled. Halim helped to kick-start these initiatives.

“How did you even get started?” I asked Halim.

“We started by asking a question,” Halim recollected as our car motored past trucks going uphill on the Karak Highway. “How do we push communications and the Internet into rural areas?”

“If you can put Internet access into Bario, you can put it anywhere,” said Leo Moggie, the then energy minister from Kanuwit, Sarawak.

Bario was a Kelabit village in the highlands of Sarawak near the Kalimantan border. As a kid, Idris Jala (now CEO of Pemandu) recollected walking one week through jungle and travelling another week by boat to reach Miri.

Halim enlisted Telekom Malaysia, Mimos and Unimas to install a VSAT facility and an Internet centre so that villagers could access voice and Internet services via satellite. When the service was launched in 2000, the headmistress in Bario spoke, in tears: “For the first time in our history, we can make a phone call from Bario.”

Halim was almost in tears, too. “We saw how the Internet opened up the whole world for rural folks, particularly kids,” Halim told me.

Now the challenge was scalability: how do you do this again and again in hundreds of obscure villages in Sabah, Sarawak and Peninsular Malaysia? And how do you put in place the systems and structures to make such an undertaking sustainable over the long-term? Or to put it bluntly: how do you avoid building glorified cyber-cafes left to rot in the jungle?

Interestingly enough, Halim’s childhood prepared him to tackle these perplexing questions.

Halim grew up in a rural village in Kuala Ketil near Sungai Petani, Kedah, where he walked or cycled 5km to an estate primary school called Batu Pekaka English School, led by the then headmaster David Raman.

“David was the best teacher I ever had. He knew we all came from very poor families,” said Halim, who grew up selling rubber, bananas, chickens and flowers from the backyard in order to buy rice, flour and kerosene. When Halim entered Standard Six, the headmaster applied for Halim to enter Malay College Kuala Kangsar (MCKK) even though Halim had not heard about the famous boarding school.

“David was extraordinarily kind and committed to us. He gave us opportunities we never had. I could never repay the debt I owed him,” Halim said.

Halim went to MCKK without a school uniform during the first week but he made the decision to work harder than anyone else. He woke up in the pre-dawn hours and walked alone across a dark field (where the “Green Lady” was rumoured to haunt) so that he could study in a lit classroom.

Halim subsequently read Economics in Universiti Malaya, graduated in the top 2% in the Masters programme at Pittsburgh University in Pennsylvania, the United States, and obtained a PhD in Information Transfer from Syracuse University (in New York, the United States) in 1988.

“I am not intelligent,” Halim said. “Coming from a rural school, I did not get much exposure to the world. But I realised I could go somewhere in life because I made the decision to work harder than almost anyone, almost anywhere.”

Hard work drew him across the divide from rural poverty to the urban middle class where he spent nearly three decades climbing the ranks in several government ministries until he became secretary-general of the Ministry of Energy, Water and Communications in 2000.

At this point, unknown to him, all the pieces of the jigsaw were now in place for Halim to repay the debt he owed to his primary school headmaster.

Halim’s reminisces were interrupted by our arrival at Felda Jengka 24 – a squat building with a dozen PCs, WiFi, a living room area and a training room. The TM chairman was given an official welcome.

Amid the speeches, I found myself drawn towards Muhammad Shafudin, manager of the community broadband centre, which was recently rebranded as Pusat Internet 1Malaysia. As we chatted, I discovered that Shafudin’s essentially a tech evangelist who transformed the broadband outpost into a community hub.

Since starting his job in 2010, he has trained more than 1,400 people on how to use Word, access the Internet, assemble computers and set up a blog. He has educated home-makers on the dangers of cyber crime. He has helped grassroots entrepreneurs set up blogs and e-commerce sites to sell products such as coins, rings, keris, frozen food, apple vinegar, olive oil, papaya seed extract, and virgin coconut oil.

“We try to give our best using the existing infrastructure in this centre,” Shafudin told me. “We do everything from sweeping the rubbish to recruiting volunteers and emceeing community events.”

If the elderly cannot come to the centre, Shafudin and his assistant manager will bring computers to their homes to educate them. Last year, Shafudin made a video on Aishah’s story which won a U-Pustaka 2012 national award.

What keeps Shafudin, a Gen Y university graduate, motivated to work in a rural place? Shafudin said he is allowed to earn extra income when he opens the centre after hours or when he provides a service, such as installing Windows into a PC.

“I use the centre to help the community, but the community also helps me. My work here has given me the business opportunities to improve my life,” said Shafudin, the father of a one-year-old son.

Ongoing efforts to bridge the urban-rural divide are being coordinated under Pemandu’s Economic Transformation Plan – in an Entry Point Project called “Extending Reach.” The first initiative is building community broadband centres such as the one I visited; 162 new community broadband centres are expected to be set up this year. The second initiative provides wireless access to selected villages through an initiative called “Kampung Tanpa Wayar.” There were 2,489 rural wireless spots built in 2012; 689 more wireless sites are planned for 2013.

Of course, transforming any community requires a combination of high-tech and down-to-earth initiatives, including revamping the local Saturday market.

One of the projects which Pemandu is coordinating with the Federal Agriculture Marketing Authority (FAMA) is to modernise local markets into a 24-hour community market called Pasar Komuniti in Jengka.

Azlin Abdullah, a Felda manager, told me the Jengka community – comprising 70,000 people who live in Maran, Jerantut and Temerloh – were fortunate to have four Internet centres. “With these centres, the kids don’t have to go to cybercafes. During school breaks, hundreds of children come here everyday. The older kids use the centre to fill in online applications for universities,” Azlin said.

“When I was in the city, I didn’t dare to touch a computer,” said Samad Arshad, the ketua peneroka of Felda 24. “Now I dare to hold a mouse.”

On our car ride back to Kuala Lumpur, I found Halim in a reflective mode.

“When we put Internet access in rural areas for farmers, housewives and kids, we are opening up their world. I really believe in that. There are kids with potential everywhere. What we need to do is provide them opportunities and facilities to realise their potential,” he told me.

At that moment, something clicked for me. I realised there wouldn’t be a Shafudin or an Aishah talking to me today if not for the foundation that Halim built a decade ago when he was secretary-general of the Ministry of Energy.

“You built a foundation of success for these people just as David Raman built the foundation for you,” I told Halim.

“What I’ve done is nowhere near what David has done for me and so many others,” Halim said immediately. After a while he nodded slowly. “But, yes, I suppose I am now doing it for others.”

Aishah herself is a recipient of Halim’s – and David Raman’s – legacy.

Since meeting Shafudin at the community broadband centre in Jengka, Aishah has begun sharing her story through her Facebook page and selling hats, bags and origami items through the Internet.

Aishah’s now downloading YouTube videos to learn beading which she hopes will make her products more saleable.

“If I could, I would come here everyday. I’m learning so much by studying what other people do in art and craft,” Aishah said, as she keenly observed me taking notes on my iPad.

Now Aishah sells only a couple of hats or bags a month. But that’s not the point. The point is that the Internet has connected Aishah to the world.

She now has the opportunity to contribute her talents in ways she could never have done before. Who knows where this will lead her? So if you are able to connect tens of thousands of Aishahs to the rest of the world, then you are, in the words of Steve Jobs, making a dent in the universe.

“There are thousands of people in the most rural areas who will flourish when we give them opportunities,” said Halim as our car re-entered Kuala Lumpur. “Even under the most extreme circumstances, we can discover human potential.”

■ Alvin Ung is a facilitator, executive coach and author of the bestselling book Barefoot Leadership. To view more videos, photos and insights on Datuk Seri Dr Halim Shafie, please visit www.businesscircle.com.my. The column and multimedia content are a collaborative effort between the columnist and the Economic Transformation Programme.