The fourth episode of our CitSciAsia Meets… interview series has been posted, with Dr Ahmad Wahab from Penang interviewed in Hong Kong by Mendel Wong
CitSciAsia Meets… is an interview series focusing on the citizen scientists in Asia. If you’ve still not seen the CitizenScience.Asia youtube channel you should check it out and subscribe here. We have recorded a number of interviews with Citizen Science practitioners from across Asia and beyond, including previous postings covering Japanese City Nature Challenge participation, environmental citizen science strategies in China and citizen science supported agriculture in India. We hope these providing videos providing a forum for Citizen Scientists interested in sharing their stories with the community and the world.
In this installment CitizenScience.Asia had the pleasure to meet with Dr Ahmad Zafir Abdul Wahab to give a Malaysian perspective on the City Nature Challenge. Dr Wahab works as Environmental Education Manager for the Habitat Foundation, which supports The Habitat Penang Hill, a world class rainforest discovery centre located within easy access of the vibrant Malaysian metropolis of Penang. Penang was one of the many Asian cities participating in the 2019 City Nature Challenge and Dr Wahab helped coordinate the event. Our interviewer Mendel Wong managed to get hold of Dr Wahab in Hong Kong shortly after the City Nature Challenge ended, and asks him how he got interested in Citizen Science, where the City Nature Challenge can fit into biodiversity monitoring. It was exciting to hear first hand about his efforts coordinating the competition in his incredibly biodiverse city.
Penang Island CNC 2019 was and had a big team of supporters behind it, including Penang Hill Corporation, Friends of Penang Botanical Gardens Society, Malaysian Primatological Society, Malaysian Nature Society, Penang Forestry Department, Penang Education Department, Night Spotting Project, Nature Classroom and Nature Walks Penang Hill.
Penang was among the diverse and biggest ever crop of Asian participants supposed to participate in the 2020 edition, with with much of the world under social isolation orders and lockdowns because of COVID-19 a competitive, community gathering event is no longer possible. As we mentioned in our last post on Citizen Science in a time of coronavirus all is not lost, and CNC 2020 will still be going ahead without the competitive aspects. Instead it will embrace the healing power of nature and encourage the collaborative aspect of the CNC. This will allow people to safely document biodiversity in whatever way they can, even from the safety of their own homes. Participants will be urged to carefully follow public health guidelines provided by your local governments, as they are changing in real-time.
Citizen Science Month has now started, and if you are stuck at home but would like to get inspiration for when we finally can go back outside again, we have more videos to cover (including two new videos from CNC participants Darrel Sharp and Roger Kendrick), so keep watching the channel to keep informed in what is happening in Citizen Science across our vast continent of Asia. Plus plans are afoot for an upcoming webinar, so watch this space for news. If you’d like to be interviewed or share stories and videos relating to Citizen Science please let us know.
CitSciAsia Meets… Ahmad Wahab (& CNC2020 update) was originally published in The CitizenScience.Asia Journal on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.
