Datuk Amar Awang Tengah Ali Hasan
KUCHING: The business community in Sarawak should exploit the opportunities created by the formation of the Asean Economic Community (AEC).
This is because the state has the strategic advantage of being an entry point to AEC which has a population of about 625 million, Minister of Industrial and Entrepreneur Development Datuk Amar Awang Tengah Ali Hasan suggested.
“Sarawak is blessed with vast natural resources and big landmass. In the past, the state’s economic development was based on primary commodities extraction which was not sustainable in the long run and thus, we have diversified our economy to manufacturing and services.
“Currently, the major economic sectors are services, manufacturing, mining and quarrying, agriculture and construction. There are still plenty of opportunities for growth in all of these sectors.With our small population, the way forward is through industrialisation, in order for us to create more wealth and prosperity for the benefit of our future generations.
“We need to think global and leverage on modern technology to expand beyond our borders,” he said when officiating at the Business Excellence CEO Forum 2016 themed ‘Business Excellence: A Strategy for Business Sustainability’ at Borneo Convention Centre Kuching (BCCK) yesterday.
Commenting on the event, Awang Tengah said it helps organisations regardless of size and where they are, identify gaps and take actions for performance improvement.
He added that the forum is a practical and holistic approach to achieve excellence in all aspects of organisational performance.
Meanwhile, Awang Tengah, who is also the Second Minister of Resource Planning and Environment, said Malaysia’s competitiveness at the international level is significant to its transformation programme towards achieving a developed nation status by 2020.
In the recent International Institute for Management Development or IMD’s World Competitiveness Yearbook 2016, Malaysia is ranked 19 out of 61 global economies. Among Asean countries, Malaysia is positioned second and sixth among 14 countries in the Asia-Pacific region.
Awang Tengah added that in the 11th Malaysia Plan, labour productivity growth is targeted to grow at 3.7 per cent per annum “for us to achieve RM92,300 added value per employee by 2020”
“While in 2015, the labour productivity was at 3.3 per cent, with an equivalence of RM75,538 added value per employee.