Hello friends and family, I am conducting a 10 week expedition starting mid October carrying out volunteer work in Sabah, Malaysian Borneo. After researching various charities conducting this sort of work I found Raleigh International, A charitable company which prides themselves on transparency of information, continued monitoring and evaluation of projects. Allowing them to assess long-term impacts of projects to constantly improve the quality of the programmes striving for lasting change. As I do not have long before I leave for the project I will be conducting some of my fundraising retrospectively. I have taken on a new job at the Gadlys Hotel working 12 hour shifts, and have been working doing theatre cleaning & volunteering for the Tour De Mon in order to raise the required fundraising goal of £3450. I have managed to raise most of the money but also am required to cover injections and flights, so any financial help or otherwise would be appreciated. The reasons for doing this project are numerous but here's a summary of my motivations.

The population of the world is growing by 200,000 people every day, as a global population we are consuming resources faster than they can be replenished. These resources are not fairly distributed and it's often the poorest rural communities that are worst affected. In the Sabah region of Malaysian Borneo many communities do not have access to basic services. Nearly half lack access to a reliable and safe water supply and nearly a third of the rural population lives in poverty with little or no formal education.

Borneo is one of the world's most mega-biodiverse areas and approximately half of the region is rainforest. A recent study published in the Journal of Ecology shows that more carbon is removed from the atmosphere in Borneo, tree for tree than in the Amazon rainforest [1]. Tropical rainforests cover only one-tenth of the planet’s land surface but they soak up about half of all terrestrial carbon dioxide, reducing the impact considerably of climate change.

Due to lack of opportunites and education about the importance of this regions ecosystem, logging has been observed to obtain timber, pulp, rubber and minerals. The increase of these has been matched with a growth in illegal wildlife trade. Satellite studies show that some 56% of protected lowland tropical rainforests in Kalimantan were cut down between 1985 and 2001 to supply global timber demand – that’s more than 29,000 km² [2] (almost the size of Belgium). A 2012 study by WWF [3] projected that if current deforestation rates continue, 21.5 million hectares will be lost between 2007 and 2020, reducing the remaining forest cover to 24 per cent (of 1980 levels). Protection laws are in effect throughout Borneo, but are often inadequate or are violated, usually without any consequences.

It is for these reasons and many others that I would like to donate my time, money, efforts and engineering knowledge to provide grass level solutions to issues faced in this region. The first of my project goals is to take part in the WASH programme: Water, Sanitation & Hygiene (Working hard and getting my hands dirty). The next goal is to promote sustainable uses of natural resources, This can inspire youth leaders to set up enterprises that prioritise green practises and allow sustainable community development. Raleigh International aims to provide information and resources to create businesses which not only will solve migration but support community development giving people tools to support their family through sustainable commerce. The final part of the programme relates to environmental conservation, where efforts are made to retrieve species of tree from the jungle and set up nurseries, with a view to reforest parts of the region. This reforestation effort and work put into creating nature walks reduce the human impact in the area and will improve the lives of some of the most endangered species in the region such as the Orangutan and Pangolin.

I am fully focused to providing my time, effort and knowledge to aiding in any way I can to this project. During my time here, I will be without mobile phone or internet connection but will be taking photographs to show you where your kind donations have been spent, improving the lives of both people and planet.

[1] http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/1365-2745.12263/abstract

[2] http://wwf.panda.org/what_we_do/where_we_work/borneo_forests/borneo_deforestation/

[3] http://wwf.panda.org/about_our_earth/deforestation/deforestation_fronts/deforestation_in_borneo_and_sumatra/