A gift that keeps growing. Trees make great gifts for celebration of joy, honouring or memorializing friends and family—and they grow and nurture the environment.  

OVERVIEW

In collaboration with UM's Department of Development and Estate Maintenance (JPPHB), The Rimba Project would like to invite the campus community, graduating classes, alumni and members of the public to be part of the co-ownership of a community park, located in the heart of the UM Campus. Our dream is to make UM a walk-in educational garden, an urban nature park, where plants and animals coexist harmoniously with humans. The co-ownership of the park will create a sense of belonging and care for the environment and public spaces, and at the same time, the community can take pride in a park that is well-cared for.  

 Replicating a success story: transformation of the Rimba Ilmu Botanic Garden's Front Terrace over 10 years, from an open space to a lush mini-forest.

This project will manage the planting of a grove of endangered native forest tree species. This area will be a major campus feature, providing many learning opportunities for student project work, academic research, edutourism, and enhance local school and community awareness activities. It will also provide a controlled environment to raise the trees and enhance the habitat for birds, insects and other urban wildlife.

THEME

"The Winged-Fruit Trees"

Dipterocarps are some of the largest and most characteristic trees of the tropical forest; many are prized for their timber. These are slow-­growing trees that produce winged fruit, dispersed by wind.

The planting location near the Samali Treehouse will make this area, in time, a perfect spot (and the Treehouse an ideal vantage point) for observing our other winged friends—birds!

TOTAL PLANTING AREA 

3,000 square metres

LIST OF TREES 

The trees below are categorised according to the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List of Threatened Species. 

The saplings range from 2 metres to 4 metres tall! 

COSTING

The overall budget for this project is RM 47,838. You can refer to the table below for the budget breakdown.

The cost of saplings has been absorbed by JPPHB. So now it's YOUR turn! Your sponsorship will help to cover the cost of tree planting, tree maintenance and interpretive materials. If we surpass our funding goal, the additional funds will go towards building facilities for the park (benches, walkways & gazebo) and purchasing saplings for our campus greening plan (we will share this plan with you!)

TEAM MEMBERS

The Rimba Project Team (L-R): Nurul Fitrah, Vanessa Ting and Benjamin Ong

The Rimba Project (RIMBA) addresses issues in urban conservation via “action research.” We see the need to consider both physical infrastructure (greening of the campus, habitat and forest protection) as well as human capital (capacity building: training in the knowledge and management of urban biodiversity). As a university, our priority is the people who will be movers and shapers in many other places beyond the campus when they graduate, change jobs, and so on. Environmental efforts should be democratised, where UM students and staff take ownership of the campus. RIMBA facilitates this by involving the campus community in our conservation initiatives.

Volunteers: The backbone of our movement

10% mortality rate is expected during the planting. Seedlings will be monitored closely, dead trees will be replaced when necessary.