Protect Coral Reefs in Malaysia

Homestay is a popular form of hospitality and lodging whereby visitors share a residence with a local of the place to which they are travelling for an authentic holiday experience. There are around 20 homestays on Mantanani Island. Unfortunately, these homestays are not popular among tourists who visited the island due to lack of marketing.

In an effort to help the locals to create a robust homestay market so that they can compete with chalets or resorts on the island, recently, Reef Check Malaysia organised Homestay Improvement Programme for homestay operators on the island. The programme had more than 20 participants and the trainings were given by certified trainers from Homestays and Kampungstay Association, Fire Department, Marine Research Foundation, Sabah Homestays as well as Reef Check Malaysia.

Some of trainings given to the participants are homestay management, package development, safety and emergency, biodiversity conservation, cultural awareness, bookkeeping and accountant, and others. It is hope with these training, the locals can diversify and improve the services that they provide, effectively market their package and service, able to manage their operation well, and thus giving them the competitive edge.

Single-use plastic bottles are a huge problem anywhere in the world. They are used only once before they are thrown away or recycled. While recycling helps to reduce pollution caused by single-use plastic bottles, in Tioman Island we want to reduce the usage of single-use plastic bottles. To achieve this, drinking water refill stations were set up at many locations around Tioman.

In each village, there are 2 to 3 water refill stations, accessible and visible to everyone. Each water refill station has two nozzles to refill water bottle, providing both hot and cold water. In addition to water refill stations set up by Reef Check Malaysia, many chalet or resort operators support the effort by providing water refill facility or service to their guests.