Groups want Perak to nix Ipoh draft plan over environmental concerns

Local residents and environmental groups have urged the Perak government to cancel its proposed changes to the Draft Ipoh City Plan 2035, raising alarms over significant environmental risks.

The proposed changes include redrawing the boundaries and converting approximately 18.62 hectares of former forest reserve land near the Meru Valley Golf Club for residential development and agricultural use.

Yesterday, environmental groups Sahabat Alam Malaysia, Sahabat Ekologi Perak, and Meru Valley residents met with the authorities in a Local Inquiry and Hearing Committee Meeting to clarify objections they had initially submitted against the plan in October 2025.

“Before Lot 559526 became alienated land, it had the status of a permanent forest reserve, which is part of the Kledang Saiong Forest Reserve that was de-gazetted on Oct 24, 2019,” they said.

Images extracted from the draft plan show that the plot of land is conveniently located near the Meru Valley Golf Club and the Ipoh-Lumut Highway, a point that the authorities and developer had used as justification.

Sensitive, hilly area

In addition to environmental destruction, the groups also cautioned against residential developments within the area, citing the risk of soil erosion and mud floods during heavy rain, especially considering the area’s hilly terrain.

“Although the land status of the proposed area has now become alienated land, we still object because the land here is still forested.

“The geophysical characteristics of the entire proposed area are hilly, the soil structure is easily eroded, and it is an area sensitive to any activities that involve the destruction of the existing land,” they added.

Moreover, they reminded that development and agricultural activities within the area could also lead to human-wildlife conflicts, highlighting how the forest reserve was also an important habitat to endangered Siamang gibbons and other fully protected wildlife species.

They said that although the area was not within the environmentally sensitive area of the Kinta Valley Geopark, authorities should nevertheless prioritise the preservation and maintenance of local ecosystems.

This, the groups stressed, would be compatible with the Perak government’s long-term goals of eventually declaring the entire Kinta District as part of the Kinta Valley Geopark.

‘Re-gazette land as forest reserve’

Following this, they demanded that the authorities urgently re-gazette the area as a protected area or as a permanent forest reserve, and for it to also be gazetted under the 1960 Land Conservation Act.

“Malaysia is a signatory to the Convention on Biological Diversity and the Paris Agreement, and therefore states should be doing more to protect and conserve forests instead of undermining the obligations under these international treaties,” they reminded.

Previously, the group had expressed similar objections when state authorities publicised the Draft Ipoh City Local Plan 2035 (Amendment) in October last year and sought public feedback on the project.

In November, Sahabat Alam Malaysia, Sahabat Ekologi Perak, and several other NGOs submitted a memorandum to the Natural Resources and Environmental Sustainability Ministry, similarly objecting to a planned 2,020ha plantation project that was also within the Kledang Saiong Forest Reserve.

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