Several agriculture industries identified for promotion — Uggah
KUCHING: The Sarawak government has already identified champion industries that offer the best commercial potential.
At present, the Ministry of Modernisation of Agriculture, Nat ive Land and Regional Development ( Manred), had tentatively selected several agriculture industries which will be promoted in the immediate term, Deputy Chief Minister Datuk Amar Douglas Uggah Embas said.
He said the industries cover commodity crops such as oil palm, rubber, pepper and sago; food crops such as pineapple, durian, banana, coconut and paddy; agrobased industry focussing on food processing; livestock industry such as cattle, buffalo, goats and edible bird’s nest ; and aquaculture industry such as shrimp and fish - jelawat, tilapia and siakap.
Uggah, who is also Minister of Manred, said they have a greater role to play this year and the ministry had adopted the development and business models - Agriculture Facilitation Programme (AFP) and PublicPrivate Sector Partnership ( PPP) - to boost the state’s food production.
He said under these models, they have decided on partnerships with anchor companies (e.g. Top Fruit for durian, Banana Bee for banana etc) as well as the development of collection, processing and packaging centres ( CPPC) , Taman Kekal Pengeluaran Makanan ( TKPM) , Ag ro - Parks, Rural Growth Centres ( RGC), Agropolitan projects, Livestock Farming Areas ( LFA), Aquaculture Industry Zone (AIZ) and plantation development.
“We have also allocated a venture capital of RM100 million.
“All these efforts are being undertaken to achieve our goal of making Sarawak a net exporter of food product by 2030,” he said in his keynote address at the Agriculture for 2019 programme.
Assistant Minister of Native Land Development Datuk Roland Sagah Wee Inn and Assistant Minister of Agriculture Dr Abdul Rahman Ismail were also present.