Fuze Ecoteer Outdoor Adventures is a Malaysian registered tour operator with experience in conservation and research. It is recognised as a social enterprise that focuses on marine conservation projects.
Fuze Ecoteer believes that people play an important role in nature conservation and that through education and providing opportunity to people of all ages to experience nature are the most appropriate ways to conserve nature.
Fuze Ecoteer is based in Perhentian Island, Terengganu, one of the famous Malaysian islands. As the recipient of The Habitat Foundation Sustainable Tourism Grant, they are funded to bring people closer to marine environment and to educate public on the importance of sustainable tourism. Their project focuses on community engagement especially in involving young people from the local community who are potentially pioneers of marine conservation rapid response team. To appeal to the younger generation, they share their project with the community through social media platforms.
The Marine Park and several local dive shops in Perhentian Island play an important role in this project as they provide training to the youths who are interested to be part of the team. The youngsters are equipped with basic diving skills and knowledge through a weekly training programme on topics such as introduction to corals, marine biodiversity, and identification of fish, which also sets their course to become marine conservationists.
Another major initiative is the development of a management system for the entire island. The funds will help to form, together with other stakeholders, a pioneering group of young people who will be involved in the joint management of the island and this project will also serve as a platform to build trust between all stakeholders involved in this initiative. In line with this effort, the team holds regular small group discussions with the villagers, hotel management, and dive shops on the island who are the important stakeholders to ensure the success of this project.
Throughout the project, the local youth team showed great interest in the activities carried out. Nevertheless, the restrictions in Malaysia due to the pandemic have led to delays in some of their projects and adjustments have to be made to the original plans. Dive shops are not allowed to open and all physical skills training had to be postponed. However, they still carry out their weekly online training regularly.
