Business upward mobility agenda proposed to increase women, youth exporters
KOTA KINABALU: The women’s wing of Parti Warisan has proposed the business upward mobility agenda for Sabah as part of the strategy to resuscitate the State’s sluggish economy by increasing the women and youth entrepreneurs’ involvement in the manufacturing sector.
Its chief, Norfaizah Chua, stated that such agenda will also provide a long-term solution to the high unemployment rate and low wage issues that have been plaguing several districts in Sabah for decades.
“We have to prioritize the business growth of our local entrepreneurs who are currently facing challenges due to high cost of doing businesses, electric and water supply instability, competition and low purchasing power by our domestic consumers,” she said in a statement on Tuesday
Norfaizah said one of the wing’s main economic agendas is to provide women and youth entrepreneurs the opportunity to upgrade their businesses continuosly, no matter what tiers they are in now, because the goal is to make them exporters and penetrate the huge overseas market.
With every upward mobility (upgrading) processes, she said more employments will be generated either related directly with their business or not and this will definitely assist in reducing the absolute poverty incidences in Sabah.
“In fact, our export-ready entrepreneurs especially those involved in the premium Halal food industry would have benefited from the low ringgit if there had been a State’s policy or strategy to facilitate their overseas market exploration,” she pointed out.
Norfaizah also said that while many will frown upon the idea of producing Sabah’s women and youth exporters, the wing believes that with the right focus and framework, it is achieveable.
“We know it is not an easy task to achieve due to the challenges of procuring assets and machineries, R&D for product enhancement, management skills, international certification such as GMP or Halal and logistic cost but we really don’t have any choice.”
According to Norfaizah, the basic framework of producing women and youth exporters should be divided to three tiers to allow progressive transitions to ensure they have the knowledge and experience before finally seeing their product brands being sold in the overseas market.
For instance, a ‘kuih pisang’ hawker who has been in operation for three years would by now know everything about banana in the market so she should consider to transition her business to manufacturing as ‘kerepek pisang’ manufacturer.
Youths selling burger should also consider to transition from stall operators to patty manufacturer - in short, their experience in their business should be considered to enable them to upgrade as SMI operators.
Those in the middle tier and currently serving the local market may require assistance in procuring assets such cold storage, freezer, retort machines, logistics - assistance extended to them should be geared to prepare them for the exportation of their products.
And those in the first tier who are export-ready must be assisted to secure new overseas market and herein we should have taken full advantage of Malaysia’s strong Halal certification and low ringgit.
These three tiers require full facilitation and commitment from the State Government to make this agenda a reality.
Norfaizah also said that the wing is working with JPRN Warisan on the framework of the party’s business upward mobility agenda and currently seeking feedback from the grassroot members.
“If we can increase the number of manufacturers, especially in food processing subsectors, then other sectors such as agriculture and service will benefit too but the paradigm shift required is ‘producing to export’.
“The wing is currently working with JPRN Warisan for the agenda’s framework for the benefit of women and youth entrepreneurs in Sabah and for this, we welcome feedback and suggestion not only from our grassroot members but other interested entrepreneurs as well.
“We all know that women is very resilient and committed when it comes to managing small businesses and what we want is that they utilize these traits to enable them achieve their highest potential in entrepreneurship,” she concluded.