Dato’ Shah Redza Hussein

Chief Executive Officer, Malaysia Forest Fund

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Bio

Shah Redza Hussein is an economist turned conservationist. He has been involved in nature conservation and environmental protection for almost 30 years. He left the corporate sector in 1997 to join WWF Malaysia to contribute directly to nature conservation. Other notable positions held was, the Executive Director of the Malaysian Nature Society (MNS), the oldest and largest member-based nature NGO in the country and Special Project Director in Malaysia with Earth And Sea Observation System (EASOS) a UK Space Agency project partner specialized in utilizing satellite  and  technology  in  monitoring,  protecting  and  disaster  forecasting  of  our  natural environment.  Shah  Redza  was  the  Director  of  the  Perak  State  Parks  Corporation  (PSPC), mandated  to  head  and  manage  Protected  Areas  in  the  State  of  Perak  which  includes  the protection, conservation and enforcement of the Royal Belum State Park, the conservation islands of the Pulau Sembilan State Park, the lowland wetlands of Kinta Nature Park and to manage the Kinta Valley National Geopark. Leaving PSPC, he was appointed the CEO of Enggang Management Services Sdn. Bhd. a private entity formed to promote and establish new landscape as  Protected  Areas,  site-based  biodiversity  protection,  protected  area  management  and developing programs for community-based conservation with special focus on active actions for the recovery and conservation of the Malayan Tiger. He was responsible in the setting up and operationalizing the Al Sultan Abdullah Royal Tiger Reserve in the greater Taman Negara forest complex, the first tiger reserve in Malaysia.  

Shah Redza is currently the CEO of the Malaysia Forest Fund (MFF), a federal government agency tasked to develop and implement instruments and mechanisms to fill the financial gap for forest and biodiversity funding to optimise their protection. Two key instruments being developed and rolled out are the Forest Conservation Certification (FCC) and the Forest Carbon Offset (FCO). MFF also studies other instruments for new and innovative nature-based financing, especially in areas of intact forest and beyond additionalities.

He is involved in various NGO and SCO work especially in areas of conservation & environmental protection,  indigenous  community  development,  sustainability  &  social  equity  and  youth empowerment. Shah Redza was awarded the 2020 Global Winner of the Dr Rimington Award for Tiger Conservation by the WWF Tiger Alive programme based in the United Kingdom. He has been appointed to the International Executive Committee of Conservation Assured Tiger Standards (CA|TS), a global accreditation organisation for tiger protection and conservation. A member of the IUCN-World Commission on Protected Areas, he is a current Fellow of the Faculty of Science, University Putra Malaysia and sits on board of the Perak State Parks Corporation.