Ferry service a dream come true, says Palawan Governor

KOTA KINABALU: The Roll-On-Roll-Off (RoRo) ferry service connecting Kudat and Palawan province, Philippines is a dream realized, said Palawan Governor Jose Ch Alvarez.

He said the service could move goods coming from Sarawak, Brunei, Kudat and the whole of Sabah to the Philippine islands.

At the same time, Alvarez said Del Monte had started producing bananas in southern Palawan and would be exporting the product through Kota Kinabalu.

Furthermore, Alvarez said Palawan had embarked on a programme to produce 1 million goats a year, after he realized the price of a goat could fetch during a visit to Kuching.

Of the 1 million goats produced, he said 500,000 would be set aside for local consumption and 500,000 to be exported to Malaysia, Brunei and Sarawak.

He said there was also plans to establish a quarantine centre for animals, including goats and cows, in Buliluyan before entering Malaysian territory.

He said this would relieve the protein requirement of the 3.5 million tourist arrivals to Sabah, which was expected to reach 5 million in the future.

He added that Palawan had 1,770,000 hectares of rice fields and coconut plantations which were mostly under-utilized.

He said the ferry service would promote the well-being of residents of the islands off Palawan that had been long deprived. He said some islands such as Mangsee, Balabac were located far away from the mainland capital of Manila.

“That is why I have to build two more small RoRo ports in December next year so that we can connect all the way to Manila via concrete roads,” he said that in a press conference after a discussion on the proposed RoRo ferry service with the Minister of Special Tasks Datuk Seri Panglima Teo Chee Kang here yesterday.

The service is expected to commence in February next year.

A Manila-based company, Archipelago Philippines Ferries Corporation (APFC), will be operating the RoRo ferry service daily between Kudat and Buliluyan, a village in the town of Bataraza, Palawan.

Meanwhile, Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines - East Asean Growth Area (Bimp-Eaga) Business Council (BEBC) regional chairman Datuk Roslan Johar said he anticipated good sales of construction materials and locallyproduced products that were in demand in Palawan and Mindanao with the commencement of the RoRo ferry service.

At the same time, he said people from Sabah also hoped to buy various agricultural products from Palawan. He said Sabah could also emulate the Philippines in adding value to the mangoes grown in the country before exporting given that many of the fruits in Sabah were eaten fresh and never processed.

He said the Philippines also spent a lot on research and development to ensure the banana it produced were free from diseases.

“We tried planting bananas in West Malaysia and all are affected with diseases. It is a good opportunity to learn to plant bananas from the Philippines.”

He said products such as bananas, pineapples and corn should be grown in Sabah to boost exports.

Roslan said the Sepanggar Bay Container Port was expecting 1.2 million twenty foot equivalent units (TEUs), yet the port was only handling 300,000 TEUs at the moment, which was predominantly imports.

“It is high time we go into the export of agricultural products,” he said.