With the community increasingly concerned about environmental conservation, Telekom Malaysia Berhad (TM) plays its bit by embarking on a nature camp programme, specifically for its employees and aptly called “BumiKu Camp”. 

BumiKu Camp, organized in collaboration with the Malaysian Nature Society (MNS), has the objective of increasing awareness and knowledge on various environmental issues and concerns amongst TM employees. The camp is also hoped to establish a network of employees to internally drive TM’s green efforts at their respective workplace. BumiKu Camp attracted a total of 120 participants voluntarily from TM offices nationwide. 

Present at the closing ceremony were Dato’ Sri Zamzamzairani Mohd Isa, Group Chief Executive Officer, TM and Prof. Dr. Ahmad Ismail, Board Member and Advisor, Environmental Education Division, MNS. 

In his speech, Dato’ Sri Zamzamzairani said: “BumiKu Camp is a great match between TM and MNS in achieving our shared intent, which is to educate the community on environmental issues and encourage them to participate in activities relating to environment conservation. Through this 3-day 2-night camp, MNS and the participants can share their knowledge and ideas via a hands-on experiential learning process.” 

At the closing ceremony, Dato’ Sri Zamzamzairani also represented TM Chairman, Datuk Dr Halim Shafie, to sign up as the first member of MNS amongst TM Staff. Dato’ Sri Zamzamzairani also registered himself as a member, joined by the BumiKu Camp participants. 

This BumiKu Camp is among various activities under the Environment platform, one of the three major platforms of Corporate Responsibility (CR) that the Company promotes – Education, Community & Nation-building and Environment.  

This year, TM is focusing its CR efforts on the Environment. Apart from supporting environmental-friendly causes, TM is also aggressively streamlining its environmental efforts across the board with some major activities in store, which includes ’greening’ awareness and implementation activities at TM premises and the community it provides services to. 

This is the first year of collaboration between TM and MNS in organising Environment Education Programmes. Earlier this year, TM collaborated with MNS to embark on a programme called “TM Earth Camp”. TM Earth Camp is a nature camp organized for students who are members of Kelab Pencinta Alam (KPA) at their schools nationwide with the same objectives of promoting environmental awareness. The programme, targeted to school children, was organized according to zones; Northern, Southern, Central, Eastern, Sabah and Sarawak running from April until July 2010. A total of 740 students and teachers from 191 schools participated in the 6 TM Earth Camps. 

To widen the reach of nature-based activities, TM collaborated again with MNS to organize this BumiKu Camp as an extension of TM Earth Camp, but this time for the benefit of TM employees. 

In this programme, participants are taken out of their working environment for adventures in jungles, where they can get invaluable first hand experience with nature, generating excitement and appreciation for the environment. BumiKu Camp is hoped to inculcate awareness on environment conservation as well as to drive the membership of MNS amongst TM employees. 

At the BumiKu Camp, the participants came closer to the Mother Nature through hands-on activities which include jungle trekking, Night Walk, flora and fauna study, bird watching, Nature Hunt, talk on Highland ecology and discussions on green initiatives as well as classroom activities on environmental topics and issues. 

Further explaining about TM’s green initiative, Dato’ Sri Zamzamzairani said: “BumiKu Camp is actually part of a bigger plan that TM has for its effort to help preserve the environment. At the end of last year, we launched an internal campaign called ‘BumiKu’ which has been positively received by our employees. Among the activities conducted nationwide under the BumiKu campaign include ‘Idea Tree’ at Menara TM Lobby which allows TM employees to hang their eco-friendly ideas, Share-A-Ride, a car-pooling drive among the employees as well as recycling competition among floors at Menara TM. Another ‘green’ initiative that we embarked on is teleworking which we introduced in February last year. We implemented teleworking for our Sales and marketing divisions and this concept can be extended to other companies as well in helping to reduce the carbon footprint.” 

CR has always been an integral part of TM’s operations and strategies, influencing the Group’s business plans, decisions and actions. For more details about TM’s Corporate Responsibilities, log on to www.tm.com.my.