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USM’s polar research

Beginning in 1983, Malaysia has strategically engaged within the

United Nations General Assembly to ensure that Antarctica is recog-

nized and safeguarded as our common heritage on Earth. Malaysia’s

interest in Antarctica was rooted in the opportunity it provides for

cooperative research of immense global scope in the areas of science,

diplomacy, management of international space, earth system and

cosmology studies, polar oceans and ice-core studies, southern ocean

research, development of early warning systems and science for inter-

national collaboration. The Malaysian Antarctic Research Programme

(MARP) was established in November 1997 following negotiations

between Malaysia and New Zealand for bilateral scientific coopera-

tion. In 2006, MARP extended its activities to the Arctic as well.

MARP’s major research interest was to establish the interrela-

tionship between equatorial and polar regions when it comes to

the causes and effects of global warming, environmental change

and impacts on the aquatic microbial community. A number of

universities in Malaysia are cooperating in this area of work. MARP

has also been organizing seminars and workshops at the national

and international levels to promote research and foster scientific

collaboration. The first biennial Malaysian International Seminar on

Antarctica (MISA) was held at Universiti Malaya in May 2002. The

sixth MISA will be held from 8-9 October 2013 at Penang.

During his visit to USM, Paul Berkman, Chair of the International

Board for the Antarctic Treaty Summit, said that the Antarctic Treaty

is often seen as a visionary precedent for governing the

‘global common’ – that is, regions and resources beyond

national jurisdictions – and that it is also very important,

with regard to the Arctic Ocean, to establish a process of

continuous policy development that explicitly promotes

cooperation and prevents discord.

As a member of the MARP team, USM has shown great

dedication to realizing MARP’s objectives to increase the

nation’s scientific capacity and research outputs. USM

is privileged to have nine researchers who have been to

Antarctica and two who have been to the Arctic.

At the

international level, the Foundation Director of CGSS,

Professor Datuk Seri Zakri Hamid, played a key role in the

fiftieth anniversary Summit on Science-Policy Interactions

in International Governance at the Smithsonian Institution

in Washington DC in 2009. Through its participation

CGSS@USM co-signed the ‘Forever Declaration’, one of

the major outcomes of the summit.

Cooperation through people-centered

decision-making

Water is our world’s most important natural resource.

It makes our planet unique among other known

planets. Given the multiple pressures on this invalu-

able resource, it is evident that in the future, water

management will have to be integrated, interdisci-

plinary and people-centred in order to minimize the

risk of water conflicts. Such conflict management will

require scientific evidence and practical value judge-

ments to secure lasting solutions. Knowledge and skills

acquired through education and work experience will

not be sufficient, by themselves, for managing sustain-

ability issues. We need in addition the ability to see

issues in perspective and to clarify and prioritize our

value systems before major decisions are made. In other

words, we need to go beyond knowledge to understand-

ing and wisdom in order to make balanced decisions

that will accommodate multiple interests in a give-

and-take manner, fully realizing that in negotiated

settlements there are always trade-offs.

For example, we know that communities value water

for various reasons, such as food, bathing, domestic and

spiritual uses, recreation, drainage, irrigation, industrial

production and waste removal. So long as supply and

demand are balanced, there is no conflict. When the

demand exceeds supply, tensions start. This has been the

case for millennia. What has changed is the scale: there are

many more people on Earth now, and we are approaching

water resource scarcity. This puts the various ‘water values’

listed above into competition with one another, because

allocating water resources to fulfil one value reduces the

availability of water for another. This is why we require

scientific evidence and practical value judgments to secure

lasting solutions, knowing where and how to prioritize

one value over another.

Decisions must be inclusive after

all views have been considered, and they must be taken in

the collective interest. We must always be open to further

iterations of the process when there are clear changes in

stakeholder priorities.

The polar@USM team in action

Images: USM polar team