KUALA LUMPUR: The Selangor government today clarified that a road and housing development project located near the Bukit Cherakah Forest Reserve and Shah Alam Community Forest was not within the Permanent Reserved Forest (PRF) area.
State Tourism, Environment and Green Technology, and Orang Asli Affairs Committee exco chairman Hee Loy Sian said the nearest PRF are the Bukit Cherakah Forest Reserve and Bukit Cherakah Tambahan Forest Reserve.
He said these two PRF had been gazetted under Selangor's National Forestry Act (Adoption) Enactment 1985.
"The Bukit Cherakah Forest Reserve was gazetted as PRF in 1909 with an area of approximately 9,642 hectares. This forest had been degazetted several times since 1976 for development purposes such as Bandar Puncak Alam, Alam Budiman and Universiti Teknologi MARA (UiTM) Puncak Alam.
"Currently, the remaining Bukit Cherakah Forest Reserve is 1,298.86 hectares and is managed by the Selangor Forestry Department as a 'hutan perlindungan' (protected forest)," he said in a statement today.
Hee said the road and housing development project area in question was part of the area degazetted by the previous state government for the purpose of ownership.
"Therefore, the State Forestry Department no longer has jurisdiction in terms of management and development in the area because it had lost its PRF status."
He said part of the Bukit Cherakah Forest Reserve was re-gazetted as the Bukit Cherakah Additional Forest Reserve with an area of 982.8 hectares.
"This forest reserve is also known as Shah Alam Botanical Garden which is the main public recreation park in Shah Alam and basically, with the existing PRF area, is ample for recreational purposes.
Hee said in terms of PRF replacement, Selangor has adopted a simultaneous replacement method for areas that need to be degazetted.
This, he said, is in line with the amendment to the Selangor National Forestry Act (Adoption) Enactment 1985 that was implemented in 2011, which is related to the need for public investigation for the proposed degazetting of PRF.
"However, the degazettement of the Bukit Cherakah Forest Reserve took place in 2006 before the amendment, so, the simultaneous replacement of PRF areas was not done by the previous state government," he said.