Hence, the State has to build skills among civil servants to enable them to respond constructively in dialogues with big investors. In this connection, the state must follow all the good things in globalization and equip the people, civil servants in particular to rise to the occasion.
Chief Minister, Pehin Sri Haji Abdul Taib Mahmud, in his speech during a special gathering of Federal and State officers, is reported to have told civll servants that they must learn new work processes and understand the position of big corporations in any negotiations with them. Basically, they must know how to work together with the private sector, which must be assisted to become a new engine of growth in the development and growth of the economy towards the year 2020 and beyond.
Essentially, new ways have to be found to create more employment and business opportunities for the new generation in the next 10 to 20 years. Besides, the State must be able to anticipate other factors that will emerge in the later stage of development. For this reason, both the public and private sectors, must build their capacity to serve. They must have greater enforcement of talents or new skills in their management to enable them to participate efficiently in the implementation of the development policies and programs, the development of SCOR E in particular that takes into consideration the changes that will take place beyond 2030.
New game
Basically, conscientious efforts must be made to attract huge capital, not in millions but billions for the development of SCORE, which is a new game to the State. The normal response of just giving incentives to prospective investors does not work anymore as big investors want a long-term relationship between them and the government. For example, if they have problems, they want to know what kind of guarantee in terms compensation to their investments. Such terms may not be spelt out in the conditions but they can be considered as incentives to attract huge investments. Generally, huge investors want to find out how the government charts the way forward. For example, they want to know whether civil servants, who represent the government, understand their requirements for better investments or not?
This represents a big challenge as, at the moment, only few officers who fully understand what the government expects of them. They still have the tendency to fold back behind the defense line just to listen and take notes of what private investors want as conditions for investing with the State. Sometimes, it is difficult to find an officer, who can advise the government on how to give favorable conditions that do not make the government to subsidize for the new development. Obviously, they do not understand how big corporations decide to commit their money on any investments. Basically, they want to know whether they can talk to the government in the same way as they talk with investment banks or not?
Colossal task ahead
Generally, the State must consider many problems, not least the environment, in accelerating the pace of development in order to attain the status of a developed country. For example, the State must refrain from spending all the money or borrowing more money and left them to be paid by the younger generations in the name of development. Such practices, if allowed to happen, will lower or jeopardize the quality of life of the new generations.
The task ahead will be colossal. It is a matter of urgency that the State must make conscientious efforts to build the capacity of the people to participate in the new kind of development in future. Of course, environmental matters must be tackled professionally to confirm with international standard. The State government did not run away from problems relating to the timber industry last time. Instead, it requested ITTO to send specialized people to study the problems and recommend steps to be taken to solve them. The State government decided to tackle the problems head on consistent with the desire to perpetuate the forestry resources so that they can be inherited by the new generations. Then, there was a big gap between the real situation and the propaganda being spread against the State by some NGOs. However, the real situation emerged by a study being carried out by experts from ITTO, which enabled the State to respond to whatever criticisms that had been labeled against it by NGOs, with greater credibility. As a rule, the State government is understood to respect good NGOs. However, it decides to leave naughty ones to join the ranks of street fighters, some of whom are tools of opposition politicians.
Social engineering
Admittedly, there is much more to be done in Sarawak than just implementing projects. For example, the State is in the process of social engineering to make the people realize that they must take advantage of the growing market forces that have been unleashed through the first phase of politics of development. For example, every village wants to have its own water and electricity supplies, clinic, primary school and others, the list of projects can be very long.
Besides, there is a real danger that the rural area may become empty as more and more young people drift to the towns in response to employment and business opportunities in urban areas. Therefore, it is of real interest to the State government to ensure that the rural areas must conform to the short -term requirements of getting the development of the delivery system working efficiently. In the long –term, the people must be willing to move into a more mobile size community. That is the final answer. Otherwise, there will be no transformation that can give people a sustainable level of development. There is a real need to relate the administrative structure to the situation on the ground.
Undoubtedly, the integrated development of the Central region through SCORE will help to convince investors that any bigger investments are justifiable; they can expect to yield big profits. In the development of Batang Ai hydro dam, the State had to seek loans from World Bank because no private investor wanted to invest in the project. It is no longer a problem to raise money from the private sector to finance projects, those in SCORE in particular, now. The State has upgraded the efficiency of the administration and raised the level of the economic development to make more attractive to the private sector.
Narrow crusading
Besides, all kind of movements outside the country talk about all sorts of things in a very narrow context. They are very ignorant about the situation in the country, about what is good for the people. They talk about the environment, dignity of labor, democracy and others in a very narrow perspective. This type of crusading by foreign based movements is quite dangerous for any developing country. They are crusading against many countries, those that have been achieving a lot of improvements for the people in particular, in Asia . As a consequent, some countries that cannot cope with the smear campaigns by these foreign NGOs, with selfish or narrow interests, even have civil wars particularly in Africa .
Admittedly, the problem that exists between the changing and rising expectation and perception, the new perception that makes the people wish for more and more things, without regards to how they can be achieved, will make development implementation more difficult. The government must find ways to solve the problem of rising expectation of the younger generations as it can complicate the process of development. It will give political leaders and civil servants migraine or headache as we accelerate the pace of development towards the year 2020 and beyond.
New dimension
The change, based on new dimension of problems spurred by rising expectations and demand for more and greater things in socio-economic development, will require the government to prepare the people for it. For example, it should anticipate that children, going to schools, are liable to enjoy greater freedom in searching for better things in life and become more creative in learning how to improve themselves. In this connection, the government must find ways to create more employment and business opportunities for them in the next 10 to 20 years.
The development of SCORE has been thoroughly planned to achieve a balanced development for the State and the country towards the year 2020 and beyond. The strategies entail development of human capital and research development capabilities, speeding up growth in rural areas, capitalizing on energy resources, engaging the private sector in development, enhancing the quality of life and improving the implementation machinery and delivery system. It constitutes a major development initiative to develop the central region and eventually to transform Essentially SCORE will act as the catalyst for the growth and development of the Central region, which will capitalize on the region’s abundance of energy resources such as hydropower, coal and gas, a pre-requisite for the development of energy intensive industries in areas like Similajau, Mukah and Tg. Manis. It will focus on the optimal utilization of natural energy resources through the development of energy intensive industries. This will be achieved through greater participation of local and foreign investors.
SCORE will also intensify the development of infrastructure connectivity, public utilities and social amenities and generally contribute towards greater growth and development of the region through the utilization of resources and providing of facilities and incentives for investment.
SCORE’s development area is located within Sarawak ‘s central region and stretches 320 KM along the coast from Tg. Manis in Mukah to Similajau in Bintulu and extends all the way to surrounding areas and remote hinterland of Baram district and Kapit division. It covers an area of 70,709 with a population of 607,800 people. It has three key comparative advantages namely land, energy and strategic location.
The abundance of land at competitive prices within SCORE development area will serve as a major attraction especially for capital intensive industries. Most of the state’s arable land and peat soils are located in the region. Besides, the region has an active timber industry, which has a vast potential to develop upstream activities such as forest plantations. Besides, the industry can also participate in higher value downstream activities like manufacturing of furniture, moldings and panel products.
The region has a full potential to generate 28,000MW of relatively cheap renewable hydroelectric energy. This is also almost equivalent to power to be produced by Sarawak is located strategically south of the booming North Asia markets comprising China , Hong Kong , Taiwan , Japan , South Korea and other major economies like Australia and India Sarawak has a great scope for assuming a new role as an industrial centre with neighboring entrepots becoming more congested and costly.
Economics powerhouse
The state, through the development of SCORE, aims to make the central region the economics powerhouse by the year 2030. Consequently, it has set the goals as follows:
· To maintain a consistently high growth of Gross Domestic Products (GDP) through widening and deepening of the industrial and economics base of the central region;
· To increase the quantity and quality of human capital;
· To accelerate the utilization of natural resources; and
· To create more employment and business opportunities in the region.
The development of SCORE is being managed and promoted by the Regional Corridor Development Authority (RECODA), a one-stop agency to facilitate all investment activities. The authority is being chaired jointly by the Prime Minister and the Chief Minister, as co-chairman, with the primary responsibility to spearhead the development, management and promotion of SCORE.
The fundamental task of RECODA is to attract investment primarily to achieve the projected investment for industries over the next 20 years and ensure that all planned physical and institutional infrastructure projects are implemented successfully. The authority, set up under the Regional Corridors Development Authorities Ordinance, 2006, has a clear commercial mindset focused on providing world-class service by minimizing service bureaucracy and operating as a one-stop agency. The priority industries of SCORE: Aluminium, Steel, Glass, Tourism, Palm oil, timber- based and oil- based industries, livestock, aquaculture and Marine engineering industries. However, paramount among them will be the energy-intensive industries, which should be able to provide trigger investments for the corridor’s advanced industrial base. Besides, the state government has also identified 67 industries, which have the potentials for development in the region.
The Federal and State governments give priority to the construction of access roads to Murum, Long Lama, Baleh and Belaga and connecting roads from Similajau and Balingian to Pan Borneo highway and connecting roads from Tg. Manis to Sibu and from Tatau/Ng.Merit to Kapit. The roads are expected to be implemented by 2010. Kapit and most of the hinterlands are still inaccessible by sealed roads. All the areas must be connected with high quality roads to allow resources like hydro electric power, mineral deposits, forestry products, human capital to flow smoothly throughout the corridor. The opening up of the mountainous regions of Kapit, for example, will facilitate the harnessing of huge hydropower potentials in Murum, Baleh and Pelagus and tapping of rich tourism products.
Essentially, the development of SCORE will focus on the improvement of accessibility to the hinterlands as the key to unlock abundant resources, which are found in them. Besides, the improvement in accessibility and connectivity will also mean development of more secondary growth centres in areas like Semop, Balingian, Selangau, Samarakan, Bakun, Ng. Merit, Tunoh, which are still remote and inaccessible by good roads. Its success hinges on good governance and excellent delivery system. It will certainly put to test the efficiency and reliability of both the public and private sectors in providing the highest level of services to investors in its development.
benuasains
*pics source: google.com images
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