Second Sabah Handicraft Centre to be set up in KK
KENINGAU: Another Sabah Handicraft Centre will be set up in Kota Kinabalu next month, said the centre’s group manager Zaiton Bakri.
She said Chief Minister Datuk Seri Panglima Musa Haji Aman would open the outlet on May 9 in conjunction of the 50th anniversary of Yayasan Sabah.
“The outlet in Kota Kinabalu will be the second for the Sabah Handicraft Centre,” she told reporters after closing a workshop on Interior Decoration Handicraft Products Development at Salingkawang hall here yesterday.
Eighty-three participants from throughout the State attended the five-day workshop.
Zaiton, who was representing Yayasan Sabah director Datuk Haji Sapawi Ahmad, said the workshop on handicrafts and interior decoration was the first one organized.
“We want to expose entrepreneurs and prospective entrepreneurs ho to make product packaging which was very important.
“When we make this craft, it is not just for the local market but for the international market too. So whatever we sell cheap looks expensive if the packaging is good,” she said.
She also hoped that all products manufactured at this centre would also be given trademarks.
“That is why local entrepreneurs who can produce new products must be given Intellectual Property (IP) of the Malaysia Intellectual Property (MIPO),” she said.
Therefore, she said, a handicraft center, which had given the product IP using Bayu Craft trade mark.
She said Bayu Craft and Batik Bayu were the cen tre’s trade marks.
“We use Bayu Craft for all our products and also Batik Bayu as a trade mark on its own identity. We use the Bayu Craft trade mark or Batik Bayu because Sabah is dubbed the ‘Land Below the Wind’.
“We hope that through this course our entrepreneurs will benefit because we believe that most of our entrepreneurs can do but they do not know a lot of things. So they will be exposed to things they do not in this workshop,” Zaiton said.
Zaiton said all products under the Bayu Craft trade mark could be accorded IP because this centre can use Geography indication (GI).
She hoped that entrepreneurs who have new products with new design would be given IP.
But she said if the product belonged to the community it must under GI.
According to her, the objective of the handicraft centre was to help entrepreneurs who wanted to succeed in craft business.
Zaiton also thanked the lecturer of Universiti Pertanian Malaysia (UPM), Mat Rasul Sidek who is an expert in the field of design.