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| DUN Buillding taken from Carpenter Street |
If the people take what are being written by bloggers, most of who are politically biased with the tendency to demonise the leadership of the State government, they are actually denying themselves of knowing the truth about Sarawak. They may think that the people of Sarawak are stupid and that the State is being run by a corrupt government. That is far from the truth. The State is about 95% of the whole land surface of Semenanjung Malaysia. It has been transformed from a backward state to one of the fastest growing economy in the country. Though it gained Independence six years later than other States in Semenanjung Malaysia, it will be able to achieve the status of a developed State with the rest of the country by the year 2020; more so towards the year 2030. It is the model of a harmonious multi-racial and multi religious society and a good example of 1Malaysia concept being pushed forward by the Prime Minister, Dato Seri Mohd. Najib Tun Abdul Razak.
Apart from a huge land surface, the population is only about 2.6 million living in more than 5,000 settlements comprising of traditional villages and longhouses scattered over a wide area. About 60% of the settlements, with distances of anything between one to 30 Km, have about 30 families only. In other words, a settlement unlike in other states of countries cannot provide the economy of scale in development.
Hence, in all the planning for development, since the First Malaysia Plan, the State government has to take into consideration all these peculiarities, though not fully understood by the Federal authorities. For example, it is the view of the State government that the development of SCORE must be put in a different context, namely its impact on Malaysia towards the year 2030. There is no question, after the year 2020 Sarawak will have the problem of how to sustain its development, the development of Sarawak as a whole and the development of SCORE in particular. It is projected that the State will be able to produce five times more income from that of today’s level by the year 2030.
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| Kuching Waterfront |
Undoubtedly, it is more desirable for the State to integrate its policy together with Peninsular Malaysia. However, at the same time, Sarawakians must be given a lot of leeway in designing the format of development that may not necessarily be quite the same as in Peninsular Malaysia. In other words, the Federal Government must give some initiatives to the State to develop the format of development that may not really be quite the same as in Peninsular Malaysia.
Global investors
Sarawak has to deal with world investors, who have got established policies on investment to give them a lot of advantages in stating their demand or requirements to set up industries locally. For this reason, the State must be knowledgeable about what the global investors want, what kind of industries that they want to set up and what they require in order to become more competitive. Usually, the investors want to negotiate for the best terms that they can get to enable them to compete with their competitors in other parts of the world. In other words, big investors, who may come with billion worth of investment, do not just come to grab little incentives here but favorable terms and conditions to enable them to compete with their competitors worldwide.
Understandably, there can be a lot of debates coming up at the Federal and state levels because of the inability to appreciate the specialist needs of these world investors. Most of them cannot be done at the policy level alone as they have got to be matched by efforts to accommodate their requirements on the ground. Therefore, success depends on the ability of the State to make the federal government appreciates that most of the problems can be tackled at the ground level rather than at the top.
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| Kuching |
Understandably, the current Prime Minister seems to be philosophically attuned to these kinds of ways of achieving better progress for the future. However, they are a lot more people that need to be convinced about his view on development in Sarawak. Basically, the federal machinery must be well tuned in to give sufficient autonomy in order to get Sarawak to be well equipped to meet the requirements of heavy industries. One good example was the establishment of MMC, a company that manufactures about 6,000 megawatts of solar cell. The company came in about a year ago and its factory in Samajaya, Kuching is about to be completed now. This is a good example of where there is a will, where there is understanding and where there is determination; Sarawak can serve industries as fast as it can.
Perspective plan after Palm Oil
The perspective plan for Sarawak after Palm oil is 20 years, not 10 years. Understandably, the people at the Federal level used to ask the State why it had to put up a plan that stretches all the way to the year 2030 and not to the year 2020 like other states. Admittedly, Sarawak is introducing something that is completely new in Malaysia. But the State government has been told that the full picture of the development of the potentials can only emerge with a 20-year plan. Therefore, all estimates made are within the period of 2030.  |
| Miri Aerial View |
The overall estimate of 1.6 million new jobs to be created by the year 2030 has got to be put forward so that the State will know how to move forward. The development involves a great deal of investment in education, development of infrastructure, sometimes more ambitious than the general plan of the Federal Government for the year 2020, and investment by the public sector to be relatively lower than the private sector in development.
The State government will invest about RM67 billion out of the total investment of over RM360 billion for the development of SCORE. The proportion will be bigger than those for Peninsular Malaysia but the impact will be beyond SCORE development area. The assumption that SCORE will only benefit areas between Tanjung Manis and Samalaju and all the way down to Baram and Tunoh in Kapit is incorrect; SCORE will benefit a much greater area. Out of the total of 1.6 million job opportunities that will come with the development of SCORE, 830,000 will be in SCORE area and the rest will be floated outside it.
Some of the spin off effects of the development of heavy industries in SCORE may help Malacca, if not Penang, where there is lots of development in the electronic sector that can use some of the semi processed products from Sarawak. Generally, there will more linkages between Peninsular Malaysia and Sarawak in development. Hopefully, it will have some implications on the State’s ability to increase export volume to Peninsular Malaysia, which at the moment is very small. The State imports a great deal of goods from Peninsular Malaysia but export very little; the ships on their return trips are normally empty.
More inter-state linkages
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| Miri |
For example, Malacca can import silicon ingots, being manufactured in Sarawak, directly from the State rather than to compete with other manufacturers in getting the same products or semi processed products from further afield. This has the advantage of keeping the money inside the country. Besides, it also gives downstream manufacturers in Peninsular Malaysia a greater security of supply of the semi processed goods. This is an example how more linkages will be established between Peninsular Malaysia and Sarawak in future. Such linkages should be able to create more jobs further afield rather than just in Sarawak.
In this connection, the people in Peninsular Malaysia can also look for jobs coming up in Sarawak as not all of them can be filled by Sarawakians. The State Government believes, though it planned for better educational and training programs five years ago, there will still be insufficient inputs into the institutions of trainings and universities to give sufficient job seekers for all the jobs that will be created in Sarawak even before the year 2020. However, more and more Sarawakians can be expected to the jobs by the year 2015. It is estimated that about 10% of the public expenditure will be in the form of manpower development to satisfy the specific match, the match of specific jobs with specific training program over time.
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| Masjid Taqwa Miri |
Generally, the economic development is moving in a different level in Sarawak. For example, the development of Palm oil industry is no longer just the development of agriculture. The commodity is going to be the basis on which the State will take part in a great deal more activities such as in research, the application of bio-technology and the production of food and pharmaceutical products. The State has a total acreage of 2.2 million hectares palm oil estates surrounding Tanjung Manis. This will give a lot of downstream industries the economies of scale to be developed in close proximity to each other.
Besides, the State converted its forestry policy about 15 years ago to allow the timber industry to develop high yielding planted forests. Then the State knew if were to stay with indigenous natural forests, it would have a dying industry or rather a sun set timber industry in a very near future. There would be no expansion, no improvement in management and no research aggressiveness that everybody would go to sleep. The State would continue to get people joining the timber industry without necessarily thinking about the new things for the industry.
High yielding timber plantations
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| Future Miri City Hall |
The State has converted about 20% of the permanent forests areas for high yielding timber plantations. The high yielding timber areas can give between five to seven times more woods than the natural indigenous forests. In other words, it will be able to double wood outputs by the year 2020 or there about. Therefore, the timber industry, which is hemmed by a lot of environmental pressures and other things, can still grow in Sarawak. The forests, 20% of which are being planted with high yielding timber, will be able to double the production of woods to make many products and even go into full integration with pulp and paper industry.
Pulp and paper industry can be supported by a timber estate of round about 50,000 hectares or more than 100,000 plus acres. For this reason, the State government has planned to have pulp and paper plants each in Baram, Kapit and Betong, which can have 100,000 hectares of forested areas to support the industry. This will tally with the overall model of the politics of development, which does not only try to mix the people to do the same jobs but share the benefits of development. Gradually, the politics of development as the philosophy of development will make a much more viable community in Sarawak by development some of the 5,000 villages and longhouses to become towns of at least 5,000 people by the year 2030.
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| Miri Marina |
Sarawak has got the target to become a more modern economy, a migration from the medium to higher income economy as envisaged by the Prime Minister, Dato Seri Mohd. Najib Tun Abdul Razak within the framework of New Economic Model by the year 2030. Then the people, who are not involved in manufacturing, can be engaged in innovative activities. They can be engaged in research works and other innovative activities. It can be anticipated that some people from rural areas will have opportunities to come back to their areas to become grassroots leaders to their community. The rural population will be able to develop further not only because of jobs but because of better access to grassroots leadership that think something new for the people.  |
| Miri Airport |
The approach of the Government transformation program may be appropriate in Peninsular Malaysia, but it has to be slightly different in Sarawak for the simple reason that it has been developing in slightly a different fashion. For example, the State does not have the privilege of having a large enough population base to allow it to participate in manufacturing in the same degree as other states in Peninsular Malaysia. A lot of the manufacturing activities started in Peninsular Malaysia from import substitution industry that grew gradually to become established industries; now they are in good position to go up the value change.
Sarawak could not start with import substitution industries not only because the population was small but it was thinly scattered over a wide area. It would be very competitive for Sarawak, with high costs of transportation of goods in bulk, to produce the same thing as in Peninsular Malaysia, where the bulk of the market for manufactured goods has already been found; therefore, Sarawak has got to be slightly different than Peninsular Malaysia.
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| Bintulu Aerial View |
Besides, Sarawak has been depending so much in oil and gas industry in the development of its economy in the past; both industries do not create many employment opportunities for the people. Hence, the State has to look to other sectors of the economy that can give sufficient jobs for the people to develop. However, it has been doing locally based manufacturing mostly on timber and has been doing quite well in it. Now, the timber industry is no longer being threatened by the prospects of Indonesia dumping a lot of their woods and timber products during downturn demands in the timber market. The local timber products have been upgraded and out of the competitive world of the Indonesian timber products. That gives the local timber industry a slight better position.
Sarawak is yet to have the entire infrastructure to open up land to diversify into agriculture. It is also yet to have the concentration of population namely along coastal areas for the purpose. The first trunk road was right into the interior that it did not serve anybody in terms of opening up land. Though, the people were excited about it, they took nearly 30 years to decide to move near to the road sides. In other words, there was a big gap between Sarawak and Semenanjung Malaysia in terms of modern agriculture development. This is still a problem in Sarawak.
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| Bintulu Terminal |
The State has been making concerted efforts, through combination of initiatives of the government and those of the private sector to open up more land to develop estates through Sarawak never had an estate before. As Sarawak had no history of estate development, it had to start from scratch. That was the position of estate development in Sarawak. Fortunately, lots of people, including those from the timber industry, were willing to venture into long-term estate development in the common efforts to diversify the economy.
Sarawak, during the last 20 years has been able to develop 1 million hectares or 2.2 million acres of oil palm estates. During the same period, it has also been able to develop more and more roads throughout the length and breadth of the State except probably Ulu Baram, Ulu Limbang and Lawas where the terrains are quite formidable. Besides, the State government has to face problems of getting the natives to co-operative among them to implement proposals to develop their lands. The State is confident that it will be able to develop the oil palm industry in a more professional manner after it has developed the sizeable oil palm estates.  |
| Future Times Square Mall, Bintulu |
Understandably, in planning for the Eight Malaysia Plan and the Ninth Malaysia Plan, the State government had to think at least 10 years to 15 years ahead, among other things, to prepare for new economic ventures with their implications on manpower build up, the development of infrastructure planning and incentives for the private sector. The development of oil palm industry has gone away from the normal land schemes being developed by the government to that of estates being developed by the private sector.
Research findings
The Government used to spend every cent of the money to develop land schemes for the people before. However, such the expenditure for almost every acre of palm oil estates being developed is being covered by the private sector, which is using good management and reliance on feasibility studies and research findings in their operations. The private sector has already developed 200,000 hectares of Native customary right land. It is in the best position to make the industry more efficient.
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| Bintulu Wharf |
Meanwhile, the State Government has also been developing an understanding with the Federal Government on what may lay ahead for Sarawak? Basically, the Federal Government must be prepared to spend more money as the State needs to develop new sectors of its economy. In other words, the Federal government must be prepared to spend more money to develop the infrastructure as pre-requisites to the development of the potentials of the State towards the year 2020 and beyond. Basically, both the Federal and State governments must look at what is the best way to develop Sarawak to migrate from the medium to High Income Economy?
While both Miri and Kuching have development to give comfort to the people, the middle part of Sarawak is losing population due to its lack of development. The population of Kuching has increased from 250,000 to 700,000 now while that of Miri town from 100,000 to 300,000. Generally there was a change in the rural- urban population structure from a ratio of 80: 20 in favor of the rural areas in the early days to that of 51: 49 in favor of the urban areas now.
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| Bintulu Airport |
Therefore, conscientious efforts have to be made to tackle the problems of areas that may lose more population in future. Such areas will get poorer if people are not being stopped from migrating out. Hence, the State government decides to arrange together areas in the middle of Sarawak and try to find out what are the resources that can become the foundation of their new development. The areas have huge hydro potentials and ½ a billion tons of coals. But the State needs a bit more fort to develop them. The development of all the potentials has to be made on integrated basis.
Competitive prices of energy
In the process, it must enhance the development of the infrastructure to stimulate the development of heavy, medium and light industries. The development will focus on generating reasonably prized energy from hydro power and coal as incentives for energy intensive industries to come. Thus was born Sarawak Corridor of Renewable Energy or SCORE, which encompasses a development area of about 60,000 sq kilometers stretching from Ulu Baram all the way to Ulu Tunoh, Tanjung Manis and Samalaju. These are the conglomerates of areas that may not be harmonious in conditions but can be integrated in development.
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| Bintulu |
The development of SCORE, induced by competitive prices of energy, can be done in a more sophisticated way. The response of investors is well placed in aluminum, manganese, steel, poly silicon ingot and other tin-related industries. The investors are very happy to come because they believe that Sarawak, which can offer competitive prices of energy, is the best launching pad to serve the growing hunger of China for the raw materials. China, at the same time, is developing a policy to hike some of its manufacturing facilities that require high consumption of energy. In other words, China is pursuing a policy to seek the higher end of manufacturing activities inside the country and allow the middle end from outside tom come in or to be more accessible to China.
Sarawak, which has been fighting from the periphery before, should be able to go right into the centre because of the change in development in Asia. The State lost a lot of competitive position after 1997 because of the rise of China. At one time, China was more or less the manufacturing hub of the whole world. But today it does not need to manufacture everything. They want to go for quality and like Malaysia wants to develop the high income economy.
Rising market
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| Niosh Building at Bintulu |
Arguably, Sarawak is in the position that fits very well with the development planning of China and India as the rising market in the world. They can be a partner for trade and joint ventures and in investment. Now SCORE has been able to attract sufficient investment to justify bolder approaches to future investment. Up to now, the most firm investments are about RM30 billion. There are some limitations in the State’s ability to service all the service industries. They want power supply before they decide to construct their industries. That means the State must fine tune the industrial development plan to meet the requests of investors. In this respect, the program to generate electricity must be carried out first in order to serve the incoming industries.
Admittedly, the development of Bakun hydro dam, being the first project being in the State has to face a lot of problems. However, Sarawak cannot afford to wait for problems relating to Bakun hydro project, with the generating capacity of 2,000 megawatts of power, to be sorted out first before it moves forward. It has to go ahead with the construction of Murum dam and feasibility study of Ulu Baram and Pelagus hydro dams with a view to make them on line for development in the next few years. At the same time the State Government is looking at Limbang and Lawas for the development of energy in co-operation with Brunei and probably Sabah. That will bring the State upfront to 6,000 megawatts by the year 2020. That will be sufficient to give a growth of more than 6.5 per cent every year. The development will be within the expectation of the federal government for the State to achieve.  |
| Park City Mall Bintulu |
The potentials of manpower development will be known once a study on it is being done. However, it can be anticipated that about 1/3 of the job creation will take place by the year 2020. It can also be anticipated that the State will be able to achieve a growth rate of between RM65 to RM75 million by the year 2030. That will be quite a good achievement. The development of downstream industries will unfold more and more after the year 2020.
More heavy industries, with potentials to attract downstream industries like aluminum factories will be created after that period. The smaller scale production will provide a lot of advantages like saving costs for refitting the aluminum and bringing them into manufacturing processes in nearby areas. The development of downstream industries is expected to happen round about the year 2015 all the way to the year 2020. The rate will increase more and more after the year 2020. This is what will happen in Sarawak towards the year 2020. The escalation in jobs creation will increase much more after the year 2020.
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| Kuching Waterfront |
This will happen in places like Baram, Ulu Lawas, Ulu Kapit, and other rural areas where the people are quite isolated from mainstream of development. The people, who have got good education, tend to be involved in one way drift to towns or cities, to look for jobs and lead a much happier life. It is envisaged that Sarawak, with the politics of development, will be able to achieve greater harmony and integration of the people through the modernization of the economy by the year 2020 and beyond. Even now it can be seen that the people are interacting among themselves regardless of their ethnic origins, religious beliefs or other differences; the people are being drawn together from all corners of the country.
The ability of the people to interact among themselves will result in a much better race relationship that fits in easily with the concept of One Malaysia. The State will be able to achieve the transformation of the economy from the medium to higher income economy and achieve better social development with the increase in the components of semi skilled jobs upward from 35% to 50% by the year 2030. The actual position will be known once the manpower survey has been completed.
Whatever it is, it will be a happy position to achieve and Sarawakians should find it worthwhile to do anything to achieve it. The people should decide to roll their sleeves, look forward and implement whatever that has been agreed to after all the debates and agreements that have been reached in the face. Sarawakians must take that opportunity as they have a lot to gain in doing so. On the other hand, they have a lot to lose for not doing so.
benuasains*Photos Source: google.com images
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