MALAYSIA STILL AN ATTRACTIVE DESTINATION
740 projects valued at RM65.3b approved in first 9 months of the year, says Mida
MALAYSIA remains a competitive location for manufacturing projects, with 740 projects valued at RM65.3 billion approved in the first nine months of this year.
This was a 16.6 per cent increase over the RM56 billion recorded from 669 projects in the same period last year, said the Malaysian Investment Development Authority (Mida).
The total investments approved were mainly in petroleum products, including petrochemicals, at RM15 billion, basic metal products (RM14.5 billion), electrical and electronics (RM7.7 billion), machinery and equipment (RM5.8 billion), chemicals and chemical products (RM4.5 billion), food manufacturing (RM3 billion), transport equipment (RM3 billion), and scientific and measuring equipment (RM2.1 billion).
These industries make up 85 per cent of total approved investments for the sector.
Compared to the corresponding period last year, domestic direct investment (DDI) in the manufacturing sector jumped 45.5 per cent to RM25.9 billion while the value of approved foreign direct investments (FDIs) increased by 3.2 per cent to RM39.4 billion.
Sarawak, Sabah, Penang, Selangor and Johor recorded the highest total approved investments with combined investments of RM51.3 billion, said Mida.
Leading sources of FDIs for the January-September period were China, Singapore, Switzerland, the United States, the Netherlands, Thailand, Japan and South Korea.
They collectively accounted for 91.4 per cent, or RM36 billion, of the total FDIs approved in the manufacturing sector.
Notable projects included those by LEM from the Switzerland and Dexcom and Ultra Clean from the US, as well as Nippon Electric Glass (Malaysia) Sdn Bhd (NEGM).
NEGM is increasing the production capacity of its glass tubing at its Shah Alam facility by approximately 1,000 tonnes per month.
Further, Mida said these newly approved investments were expected to create 51,172 jobs.
It is also striving to attract more quality investments in capital-intensive, high-value added and high-technology projects.
This is reflected in the increase of the capital investment per employee to RM1,276,774 in the first nine months of this year compared with RM1,039,769 in the same period last year.
Through targeted approaches, the government would ensure that the economy remained on a steady recovery trajectory, it added.