The Hon Datuk Christina Liew, minister of Tourism and Deputy chief minister of Sabah, Malaysia, presented World Tourism Network Chairman Juergen Steinmetz with a beautiful souvenir bag from Sabah, north Borneo.

In a meeting at the Sabah Stand at the just concluded ITB Travel Trade Show, Steinmetz discussed with Minister Liew and her team of Joinston Bangkuai chairman and Julinus Jeffery Mint, CEO of the Sabah Tourism Board opportunities to increase visibility of Sabah’s unique tourism destination beyond its current source markets.

The minister pointed out the increased dircect air connectivity between Sabah and its travel and tourism source markets.

Steinmetz invited Sabah to join the growing network of members in the World Tourism Network in 133 countries. He said WTN’s focus on Small and Medium-sized tourism enterprises seems to be an excellent match for Sabah, an industry run by many small individual enterpreneurs that understand sustainability, love nature and responsible business opportunities.

World Tourism Network recently started a chapter in Kuala Lumpur, and the expansion of a similar chapter in Sabah would be a win for Malaysia tourism as a country.

Sabah’s signature attractions range from nature-based to cultural attractions with the intention of conservation and preservation in mind. Sabah is located on the northern part of the Borneo Island, and is part of Malaysia.

The Kinabalu Park is Malaysia’s First World Heritage site. The area is approximately 75,370 ha of land which includes parts of 3 districts of Sabah; Ranau, Kota Belud and Kota Marudu. To put into perspective, the park is bigger than Singapore (said some on Google).

Kinabalu Park, houses two mountains which are Mt Kinabalu (highest in Malaysia) and Mt Tambayukon (3rd highest). The Mountain is the anchor tourism product in this area. It also serves as a playground for scientists and researchers due to its accolades of covering 6 types of vegetation zones from lowland rainforest to alpine scrub; hence, it was dubbed the center for plant diversity for South East Asia.

ipadan has appealed as one of the top dive sites in the world. It has been highly sought after by divers for its array of possible sightings. The mushroom like island (from a far off eye level view) offers 12 different dive points.

Some say that Barracuda Point is the best especially for the opportunity to be amidst a swirling vortex of barracuda. Other say, the Drop Off is even better in terms of experience which only requires a 9.14 metre walk on the beach before dropping off into the water, and to then go around the island wall which is 600 m from the ocean floor.

Sipadan is well known for its unusually large numbers of green and hawksbill turtles which gather there to mate and nest and it is not unusual for a diver to see more than 20 turtles on each dive.

More than 3000 species of fish and hundreds of coral species have been classified in this richest of ecosystems and thus made Sipadan an important marine habitat in this region.

A naturalists’ paradise, the Danum Valley Conservation Area, located around 80km away from Lahad Datu town, is renowned for its intricate ecosystem and is officially designated as a Class 1 (Protection) Forest Reserve under the Sabah Forestry Enactment 1968. The enchanted forest functions as a habitat for a diverse array of flora and fauna, including but not limited to the banteng, clouded leopard, orangutan, slow loris, proboscis monkey, and the critically endangered Bornean pygmy elephant.

Danum Valley is also the home to the Yellow Meranti tree species (Shorea faguetiana), which has the distinction of being the tallest tropical tree in the world. With a measured height of 100.8 meters or 330.7 feet, the colossal tree referred to as ‘Menara’ (derived from the Malay term meaning Tower) stands a mere 21.2 meters shorter than the renowned Tun Mustapha Tower located in Kota Kinabalu.