Silver Award in ”Best at Wildlife & Nature Conservation” category for Malaysian island resort and homegrown biodiversity management initiative

Pulau Tengah, December 12, 2019 – Batu Batu Resort and Tengah Island Conservation (TIC) are proud to announce its Silver Award win in the Best for Wildlife & Nature Conservation category at the prestigious World Responsible Tourism Awards 2019 at the World Travel Mart (WTM) held in London, United Kingdom recently.

Now in its 15th year, the purpose of the annual WTM World Responsible Tourism Award (WRTA) is to inspire, educate and challenge. The WRTA encourages change in the industry, and singles out for recognition those who are taking responsibility and can evidence that they are having a positive impact, that they are making tourism better. In the Best for Wildlife and Nature Conservation category, judges looked for innovative examples of tourism businesses that have made a demonstrable and significant difference locally, initiatives which they hope will inspire and encourage others and which have not been dependent on a great deal of external grant funding.

“As a tourism operator, we strive to operate responsibly and believe that tourism must support biodiversity and local communities. It has been an extremely challenging journey, and to be recognised alongside this cohort of incredible organisations for something that we work hard at every day is an amazing achievement,“ said Cher Chua-Lassalvy, owner and Managing Director of Batu Batu Resort.

Batu Batu is an unspoilt island retreat on Pulau Tengah in the protected Johor Marine Park off the east coast of Peninsular Malaysia. The resort strongly believes that private sector tourism can act as a catalyst for positive change through the preservation and regeneration of the rich but fragile biodiversity around its amazing island and beyond. As evidence of Batu Batu’s conviction that tourism can have positive impacts on the local environment and community, the resort founded and provides core funding for Tengah Island Conservation (TIC), a biodiversity management initiative dedicated to the research, rehabilitation and regeneration of the surrounding natural environment.

Tengah Island Conservation (TIC), is based at the Tunku Jalil Conservation Centre on Pulau Tengah and employs four full-time conservation scientists. To date, TIC has released over 17,500 critically endangered and endangered sea turtle hatchlings, patrols 21,000 acres daily to prevent poaching, removed over 18 tonnes of marine debris from local beaches and reefs over 2018 and 2019 and cleaned, mapped and surveyed over 1,000,000 m2 of coral reef.

Batu Batu and TIC jointly have also initiated the Mersing Islands Multi-Stakeholder Sustainable Tourism (MUST) Action Plan together with the local Mersing District Council and other stakeholders, as well as an environmental awareness programme in schools. The MUST programme aims to co-create structured, informed multi-stakeholder tourism planning for the area to conserve the area’s valuable biodiversity for the benefit of local communities and future generations.

Tanya Leibrick, Programme Director for TIC said “We are over the moon to have been recognized at the prestigious WTM World Responsible Tourism Awards. As a first time participant, we are incredibly proud to have won a Silver Award, and of our team and all their hard work. TIC started as conservation project within Batu Batu with a team of two. With their support, we are now a registered non-profit organisation with a team of four scientist and hope expand our conservation programmes to try to make a real difference to environmental protection in our area. It is a great example of tourism supporting biodiversity and the positive impacts that can come from partnerships between the private and non-government sectors.”

For more information on WRTA go to: https://responsibletourismpartnership.org/world-responsible-tourism-awards-2019/

About Batu Batu Batu Batu is a rustic off-grid island retreat set amongst coconut groves, rocky outcrops and eight fine sand beaches on the uninhabited island of Pulau Tengah in the Johor Marine Park, Malaysia. The island is just three hours by road and boat from Singapore and was constructed by local carpenters with a variety of tropical hardwoods in the Malay vernacular style. The 20 one-bedroom and 2 two-bedroom villas are nestled into the island’s wild and natural environment in a way reminiscent of a Malay ‘kampung’ or village. Batu Batu is the founder and funder of Tengah Island Conservation, a non-profit biodiversity management initiative which runs conservation and regeneration projects on and around Pulau Tengah, including the State’s first privately funded sea turtle preservation initiative. For more information please visit www.batubatu.com.my

About Tengah Island Conservation Tengah Island Conservation (TIC) is a biodiversity management initiative located at the Tunku Abdul Jalil Conservation Centre, Pulau Tengah, an island within the Johor Marine Park, Malaysia. Founded by Batu Batu, a sustainably-focused, off-grid resort, TIC is dedicated to the research, rehabilitation and regeneration of our natural environment. TIC’s systemic and community-driven approach is to conserve and protect flora, fauna and marine ecosystems by informing, inspiring and involving relevant stakeholders, government, biodiversity specialists, the tourism industry, and local community. For more information, please go to www.tengahislandconservation.org

Contacts: Batu Batu Resort: Chee Shin Yee

Email: shin@batubatu.com.my

Tengah Island Conservation: Tanya Leibrick

Email : conservation@batubatu.com.my