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I'm
Jamie Hello and thanks for listening to the climate conversations
today.
I'm talking about Malaysia's 2059 0 emissions targets, Prime Minister Ismail Sabri announced the country's goal are reaching net zero by 2015 at the earliest. When he unveiled the 12th Malaysia plan in parliament, he outlined a slew of measures to get the country to net zero, such as an end to new coal fired power plants, more installed renewable energy and the carbon tax. But how achievable is net zero by 2050 for Malaysia? What would it mean for
its economy from fossil fuels to palm oil? Or can it be a leader in Southeast Asia? With me today is Henry Adnan, executive Director of the Malaysian Institute of Economic Research, he's also the former ceo of the Langkawi Development Authority and specializes in sustainable development solutions across fields like the green economy and natural resources governance. Henry welcome.
Thank you, jeremy, thank you for inviting me to the conversation.
I want to get to the first question. Tell us your reaction when you first heard of Malaysia's carbon neutral goal, were you surprised or were they already signs that policy makers were gearing up towards it?
I was very optimistic and upbeat when I heard that because given what's going on in the country and the fact that the leadership can still be more attention to climate change is really welcoming. I thought the emphasis on climate change is not new in Malaysia, but of course the question is on the implementation
since you mentioned that talk us through in your view how successive governments have taken on climate change stepping up, not just domestic action, but internationally as well. I would presume. How has this government under PM is more Sudbury deferred potentially from earlier ones from PM Najib two PM. I had it when he didn't on climate change and larger sustainability issues.
Malaysia has always been instrumental in international negotiations on sustainable development in general. So particularly climate change and university together with India and brazil, We were very instrumental in getting the development component to be part and parcel of international negotiations way back in the first reel in 1992. And since then, our leadership on climate change issues with a number of countries have taken a number of guises.
This is an international level, but it's always in the interest of protecting the developing world. And this distinction between the development of developing country has always been there. We've also managed to get the people society measure to be interested along the same line. For instance, the world network
is very known International. NGO started from Penang and started to sort of play on the common but differentiated responsibility so internationally has always been playing a role there, particularly emphasizing the role of developing countries within the country, of course design and was a watershed year when the green technology portfolio was introduced by Prime Minister Najib along with that we had the sustainable energy development Authority
established and a few other sectoral plans were also made to the four at the policy level, There's been a number of adjustments along the years from uh you know, in 2000 and we had a 40% reduction carbon industy there was conditional that transfer and also fund from developed countries in 2016 we upgraded that the Paris agreement to 45% by 2013 emission tests per GDP. And then there was a couple weeks ago when promises on the subway announced that 45% reduction based on 2030 G. D. P.
And this is unconditional. It's sort of evolved over the years. I think this is very welcoming. The implementation is the challenge of course.
So I was going to get to the implementation and if you look at the longer term 2050 goal or 2050 at the earliest as the PM said, as far as zero emissions are concerned. When you look at the overall structure of the Malaysian economy and it's the same thing for countries like Singapore and elsewhere as well. When you look at the overall structure of it, there will be parts of it which are dependent on petrochemicals and other sort of emissions intensive industries.
How do you think Malaysia's economy will start evolving between now and towards its goal of 2050 structurally as well, moving away towards certain industries are helping them transition. And then when you look at that kind of decarbonization economy, where will new revenue streams were coming on for the Ministry of Finance for example?
Excellent question? The emphasis by Malaysia over the years has always been to combine, you know, forest conservation with increasing renewable energy into the energy mix. And we're also focusing on low carbon cities or promotion of public transportation and greener urban planning. So that's always been the sort of a holy trinity of Malaysian response. Moving forward. We need to ask the hard question and address as we put the dependency on oil and gas for instance.
And this is where I think the recent emphasis on hydrogen economy will be if well undertaken will be the game changer for, you know, the heart to de carbonized sectors like the holiday or transportation sectors and also the oil and gas sectors. I noticed that the government since downstream we need to cover them. Similarly with Sabr is continuing along this line
of looking at hydrogen economy as a game changer. The welcoming news is the fact that now through our government is putting more efforts, in fact the most advanced when it comes to hydrogen economy, they are encouraged to what's happening in brunei, you know, japan is importing hydrogen from benign. So there is this neighborhood rivalry there, these are the kind of new things that have to happen for us to recognize the hard to recognize sectors.
I think a lot of it also will come from this so called green Tech master plan, You've been a bit involved in that. Tell us a bit about that as well. And in rough strokes, where does Malaysia see the potential for green tech
screen tag has been? Yeah, I put in place since 2009, but it's been a slow uptake over the years. I remember in 2000 and nine or 2010, the government announced green technology financing scheme amounting to one billion ringgit Malaysia at the time, I remember it was oversubscribed, you know, in the first day it was announced, the tough call happened when they approached the bank, but this is the government guarantees soft loan program and the bands were not very sure of how to
deal with the risk of green technology financing. You know, so it has taken some years for the country to begin to get our act together in countries, but I left the environment seen for a couple of years to take up a position in government, Mainly focusing on tourism. But when I returned recently into the environmental community, I am very surprised with the level of interest in the private sector in government, in civil society.
For 20 years. We happen only to, you know, Bob into the same people in all meetings. But now there's so many new players, I can name a few new groups like the Climate Action Network, a group of young members, grassroots group, 85% of them are below 25 77 are women. But there's also a climate governance Malaysia, which is the chapter of the world, Economic forum, climate governance initiative, a network of non executive directors.
These are the new players in the scene and pushing the government pushing the society to increase their attention on climate change. So it's very welcoming, I would say.
Interesting you say that because I can see the parallels here over here in Singapore as well, because in the last 2, 34 years as well as a significant uptick in not just civil society, but also government and private sector interests, the finance sector interest in terms of how you do green financing. So yeah, it's been an exciting couple of years for the overall sector, you know, part of the world. For sure, I want to now again, a little bit about something which, again, Singapore has also
been grappling with it. I'm sure Malaysia will grapple with it at some point, is the power generation and how we generate energy for our economies. Right? According to the Iaea, the share of natural gas, the power mix of Malaysia actually fell a little bit between 2000 and five and 2015
because of declining domestic gas production. So, Malaysia, to some extent is reliant on coal and your PM has said he hopes to replace coal power plants with gas fired plants, how will this transition take place do you have a goal in your own mind as to how quickly this can realistically take place? And I suppose as we've said earlier, these are going to be depend on quite significant shifts
in the Malaysian economic structure. If they're going to move away from emissions intensive power plants such as the coal fire ones.
If you look at the policy documents or the commitments by people in Putrajaya, you are very encouraged and what's going to happen. But the devil is in the details they always see. And this is now being held by the government. I think there is a long term emissions development strategy not being developed. So they're looking at the details, you know, accounting of the sectors including the power sector and this will only
be finalized in June of 2022. So it'll take a while before we can begin to see how are you going to prioritize some of these areas coming back to cole? This is the challenge. You also see this internationally with the southern Hike in oil price emphasis on decarbonization across the world, including the big players like China. Even when you take a close look at the recovery package, you know, of many countries, there's one study done, they look at 31 stimulus packages all over the world.
It was only a small fraction given to actually renewable energy despite what being announced. You know, So there is this discrepancy between what is promised and what is being done. And this is where I think you need more details and the details now being worked out in Malaysia? I look at the 12 Malaysia plan, which was released on the 27th of september and I was being passed by both the genre and the one negara in Malaysia,
The word circular economy for instance, appeared 79 times. So we are not worried when it comes to government commitment on paper, but we are very interested to see and we should be part and parcel to help the government to really work out the details coming back to court. Even the big players like DNA Malaysia is paying more attention to recently. I was in a webinar and they have a new section that looks at decarbonization.
So it is being worked out I believe. But uh, one important point that we should note the past two years that you said has brought in new players into this climate change policy domain. The challenge is to get everyone together and to work with the government to detail out so that it won't just be greenwashing.
I'm glad you raised the point about what we were supposed to be a green recovery right? As we had hoped last year, at the height of the covid pandemic, there were suggestions that there will be a surgeon sort of economic stimulus is that were green and sustainable, but you know, maybe it hasn't worked out as well as we would have hoped on the issue of renewables and
hopefully we're getting there sooner rather than later. Where do you think renewables will stand in Malaysia's plans to go carbon neutral at some point in time, It wants 31% of installed power capacity to be renewable. So this includes hydropower in the longer term. As long as you would like whether you see hydro plus solar and wind for a country like Malaysia
hydropower, the big potential has always been in peninsula also in Strada and also some we are left with the mini hydropower plants. There are still potential in states like there are for instance has great potential for media hydro and that now is being developed by the private sector with government on the wind site. Unfortunately, Peninsular Malaysia does not sit in the wind region if you like, you know, there's a measure one or two
m so we are not in that map. So we are in a low wind potential area in someone there is that potential that is now being developed as well. I was made to understand recently, the company that has just signed on for the development of wind power in Sabah solar, there is a spike and interest on large scale solar systems. Of course there are other issues related to that, you know, with land use tension and all that. But there is that growing interest in that area as well.
The question is, how do you bring everything together again? This is where we need a new entity that brings together the different players. Government is in the midst of coming up with a center on climate change. This should be able to bring a different players together. But again, it's not going to happen overnight. So we have to look for another year or two more years before this can happen.
You know, countries like us here in Singapore have been looking increasingly into the even part of renewable and cleaner energies from other countries. Do you think that this is something that Malaysia may be looking at two importing more clean renewable energy and how would you think this will balance between its own domestic capabilities with fossil fuels with renewables plus the potential to import, would that be an option ever? You think
that has not been discussed widely as yet in Malaysia will say because we still think that we are a resource rich country and everything should be produced here. But just to add to my earlier point about solar in particular is that I remember a senior bureaucrat once said that not all electrons are created equal, there is this question of stability, you know, and intermittent
sea of solar for instance. Yeah, the way forward for Malaysia is to really look at the technical details and work out how the loose and can be tightened up rather than importing. I think that's a different scenario demolition Singapore there, you
know, one of the things that were raised most recently was obviously the role of a carbon tax in helping Malaysia reached its goals in the longer term. Carbon taxes everywhere are always going to be controversial politically. Even here in Singapore, there's always going to be some
pushback there. How is the Malaysian government you think going to transition away from as it stands now, even fossil fuel subsidies towards, you know, the opposite end of the political spectrum or policy spectrum towards taxing fossil fuel consumption, Is this going to be difficult, you think?
Yeah, it's not going to be a walk in the garden, but the government has mentioned this and there's also think tanks like the indian Institute for instance, has sort of worked out a detail for what amount of carbon price should Malaysia explore in the next few years, because we are now looking at sort of expanding our fiscal space in Malaysia and the Ministry of Finance is seriously looking
at the introduction of carbon tax. But the question is, what is the pricing and what is the mechanism that's still being worked out? In addition to that, is the announcement by the government of the domestic emissions trading scheme or the E. T. S. So there is to boost the sort of carbon exchange
domestically as well. So, these are the kind of ideas in the pipeline, which we're really excited to see how this will turn out introduction of new text in the current situation is not going to be very popular,
especially if election is just around the corner. We will have to be very patient in seeing the production of these new measures in Malaysia, but the fact that we are talking about it seriously and I would also happen to add that the Ministry of Finance in Malaysia has been very proactive in the past two years, looking at, you know, how the environment can be part and parcel of the new fiscal regime and all that for instance, uh in the latest budget, there's a mention of the ecological transfer
scheme involving the states, so they will be very proactive, usually would be a bit ambivalent about all these things and we have the economic planning unit in Malaysia that will be pushing for greener measures. But now we are seeing even the Minister of Finance under the leadership of who's a friend who's a banker, I think the banking sector is also responding very aggressively in the sustainability domain. He brings that culture into Ministry of Finance
Here in Singapore from the time that the hint was dropped, that there will be a carbon tax to eventually setting the rate and then, which was relatively low in the first place, five Singapore dollars. And then now for the Hindus they will indeed go up even more in the coming years that took some time.
So I suspect it will probably take as long as that for Malaysia to, but it'll be interesting to see eventually how the rates in the two countries sort of feed off each other because I suppose there will have to be some degree of looking over the shoulder and seeing what each country does and hopefully there'll be some room for cooperation as well when it comes to emissions trading schemes and things like that. I wanted to transition
out to our last couple of questions. And one of the things that you raise very early on in our conversation was Malaysia's flow on the international stage where it has in the past being at the forefront with fellow developing countries in ensuring that the interests are met and considered. For example, the international negotiations, Are you keeping an eye on what's happening or what's going to happen in Glasgow.
And when you think about what Malaysia can do and what other developing countries want to see happen from cop 26, how do you think it's gonna pan out and what do you think it's a good outcome for Malaysia?
The financing dimension of the negotiation will be very important and very important thing to watch for the developing countries in particular, for those who have been observing the development, of course are our best bet is to be cautiously optimistic because we've seen what happened in Copenhagen, but now it's also a very challenging time given that we are just reeling from the impact of pandemic globally and most countries are struggling with the basics of vaccines and
burden on the fiscal space. So in fact, Malaysia is also sending a smaller delegation to Glasgow this year compared to previous years and I presume it's going to be the same for other developing countries as well. But we also see more commitments this part of what awful things that's happening out there. There there greater commitments by
many developing countries. I'm cautiously optimistic on the outcome, but we are hoping the big countries will commit more given that the rest of the world is really really from the impact of pandemic.
As a final question then, you know, maybe you can give us a little bit of insight into domestically, how the Malaysian people and you made a brief reference to this in terms of the ngos that have emerged and are playing stronger and stronger roles. Everyone has come through quite a hard period the last 18 months or so with COVID, Malaysia has also had a certain degree of political uncertainty.
How difficult is it to move beyond this? Start pushing the climate agenda again and then do you think there's going to be as well? A dynamic between the federal government's goals and where does the state governments lie as well in pushing climate and sustainability agendas? Will they have the support of the people? Is there enough interest going forward in the, in the coming years?
The debate on climate change tends to be l centric, I would say, but the impact is being felt by people in the rural areas as well, you know, for instance, in places like where I am from, there has been a number of drop events that it cost two planting seasons to be missed and that has caused a great deal of suffering for
the people there. And if you go to the, on the ground, you know, particularly during drought time, you can see that the agricultural sector is suffering particularly for the rice planting areas of the grand jury areas in Malaysia, there must be an effort to communicate this to the broader public and I think the growth of more ngos coming to the fore is something healthy. But the other thing is also expected to be hydrological certainties.
The flood zones in Malaysia is expanding. For instance, there is one study that looked at the expansion of super hot, flat prone area, so we are going to see about 200% increase in this area by 2030, similarly in quarantine, so more people will be affected by floods and we have to make this discourse something that matters to everyone, not just among the putrajaya bubble or the banks, a bubble of Malaysia,
more communication is needed. Most importantly, Jamie, if we have to have a strong voice, environmental voice in the august House of Parliament. Currently we don't have anyone championing environment strategically in the parliament. Hopefully the election simulation public will elect more environmentally conscious people to be the member of Parliament
on that. Very slightly more optimistic note. Best of luck to you and Malaysia as well, has Rhiannon. Thank you so much.
Thank you, jimmy
and thanks for listening to the climate conversations. Stay up today on CNN's coverage of climate change on sienna dot asia. You can also find this and other Sienna podcast on our website and on itunes and Spotify team behind this podcast, Christina robert, lynch tooling and Aaron Low and I'm Jamie Ho till next week. Mm hmm.