SINGAPORE: Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore and Thailand have agreed to continue sharing information on a government-to-government basis on hotspot areas that give rise to transboundary haze at a meeting here today.

Singapore’s Environment and Water Resources Minister Masagos Zulkifli described the agreement as the “biggest agreement” at a press conference held in conjunction with the 18th Meeting of the Sub-Regional Ministerial Steering Committee (MSC) on Transboundary Haze Pollution, comprising the five countries.

“We are going to move forward on sharing information. It’s a pro-forma agreement where countries must share information where the hotspot areas are.”

He noted that previously, there was a lot of “pushback” in the sharing of information, including anonymous information.

“With this agreement, we can move forward,” said Masagos, who chaired the one-day meeting.

He pointed out that currently sharing information on hotspot areas was an achievement as the MSC countries were facing difficulties in sharing land use and concession maps.

The MSC was formed in November 2006 to enhance haze collaboration in the southern Asean region.

At today’s meeting, the ministers recalled that leaders at the 27th Asean Summit held in Kuala Lumpur on Nov 21 last year, had noted the initiatives by the MSC countries and encouraged them to take the necessary actions in order to operationalise the Asean Sub-Regional Haze Monitoring System (HMS).

The ministers also noted the Asean Specialised Meteorological Centre’s forecast that dry weather conditions were expected in Sumatra and Kalimantan between June and early October this year.

With the El Nino expected to return to neutral conditions by mid this year, and with a chance of La Nina developing in the third quarter of this year, normal to above normal rainfall can be expected for the region during the season.

Nevertheless, the MSC countries pledged to remain vigilant as well as continuously monitor and step up their haze prevention efforts to minimise any possible occurrence of transboundary smoke haze from land and forest fires in anticipation of drier weather in the coming months.

The ministers also recognised that it was timely for a regional study to be conducted on the economic, health and social impact of haze in 2015 in the Asean region.

They opined that the study was crucial for Asean to assess the implication of the 2015 haze incident and enable countries to have a baseline economic, health and social data to understand the impact of transboundary haze.

The ministers agreed to task the Asean Secretariat to collate the necessary information initially from MSC countries in accordance with their national laws and regulations.

Meanwhile, Masagos said that a “substantive” outcome was expected within a year as most data were already in place.

Nonetheless, each country would have a different set of data in which area it was impacted the most, he added.

“Singapore is studying the impact of haze on the tourism sector, while Indonesia sees a reduction in the yield of crops.”

At the meeting, Malaysia was represented by Deputy Natural Resources and Environment Minister Hamim Samuri. Asean Secretary-General Le Luong Minh was also present.

– BERNAMA