From left: Tong, Iskandar, Ramuseren and Ruslan holding a framed copy of the document.

PETALING JAYA: GreenRE Sdn Bhd and the Construction Research Institute of Malaysia (Cream), under the purview of the Construction Industry Development Board (CIDB), has launched a joint certification framework for their rating tools, GreenRE Rating Tools and MyCREST.  

GreenRE chairman Datuk Seri FD Iskandar and Cream chief executive officer M Ramuseren penned the documentation for the collaboration, which was witnessed by Real Estate and Housing Developers’ Association (Rehda) president Datuk NK Tong and CIDB safety, health, environment and quality division manager Ruslan Aiman. 

Under the framework, GreenRE will act as the lead certifier for private sector projects through its soon-to-be-launched GreenRE Non-residential Building (NRB) v4.0 rating tool while Cream will lead certification for government sector projects through MyCREST v2.0 Design and Construction rating tool. 

With the joint certification, both rating tools aim to achieve a similar carbon reduction score to each other, while all pre-requisites covering high-impact areas to reduce embodied and operational carbon will be mutually adopted. The first stage will cover new non-residential building projects only while other categories such as existing non 

residential, residential, industrial and healthcare projects will follow suit in later stages.  

“GreenRE is proud to spearhead ESG initiatives that will benefit the industry and the  

rakyat, in line with REHDA Malaysia’s slogan ‘Towards Sustainable Development’,” says Datuk NK Tong, President of REHDA Malaysia which is also GreenRE’s parent organisation. “The joint certification marks a new milestone in the collaborative partnership between the two entities, following the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) in 2021 aimed at synergising efforts towards promoting sustainable development in the property and construction sectors. For developers, this will mean that the road to obtaining green certifications from both GreenRE and CREAM will be made much easier and faster,” he further added.

With the joint certification, REHDA and GreenRE reiterate the commitment to support the Government in all its measures that benefit Malaysians, and we will continue to encourage our members to uphold our nation-building role of providing quality, affordable homes for the rakyat promptly.