S’wak an excellent place for investment, Awg Tengah tells seminar participants
ALMATY: A significant amount of investment totalling USD$ 8.9 billion has been approved for Sarawak’s manufacturing industry since 2011 to March this year as the state offers numerous attractions and trade opportunities in both resourcebased and non- resourced based industries.
Industrial Development Minister Datuk Amar Awang Tengah Ali Hasan said among the resource- based industries with good investment potentials in the downstream processing activities for investors were the halal, palm- oil based, food processing, wood- based, petrochemical and ceramic sectors.
He was delivering his keynote address at the Sarawak Trade and Investment Seminar and Business Matching held at the Ritz Carlton Hotel here yesterday.
Awang Tengah also spoke on the Sarawak Corridor of Renewable Energy ( SCORE) built on the availability of the abundant energy potentials, especially hydropower of up to 20,000 MW by 2030.
He explained that the energy provided by hydroelectric through the Bakun and Murum dams was stable in terms of costing in the long run, green and renewable, adding that examples of energy intensive industries already established in Sarawak were aluminium smelting, polysilicon, metallic silicon and ferro alloy.
For this purpose, the Samalaju Industrial Park with an area of 8,000 hectares is being developed with a new township and dedicated port, he said.
“The response from investors, both foreign and domestic on SCORE is indeed very encouraging and to date about USD$ 8.3 billion worth of investment had been approved in SCORE,” he added.
He said SCORE required a lot of raw materials especially minerals and this was where Kazakhstan investors had the potential to fit in the supply chain and besides that, those involved in industries that were high on value- added with technological innovation should also come and invest in Sarawak.
Awang Tengah, who is also Second Minister of Resource Planning and Environment, said the presence of world class industries would ultimately help to position Sarawak to compete well at the global level.
In inviting Kazakhstan investors to the state, he also touched on the contribution of the timber sector whereby in 2013, Sarawak’s export earnings on the activity was USD$ 2.2 billion, creating about 100,000 job opportunities.
“As Sarawak is yet to export timber and timber products to Kazakhstan, I hope today’s ( yesterday) seminar will pave the way for business relationship between Sarawak timber industry and Kazakhstan timber importers,” he said.
Awang Tengah also noted that members of his delegation comprised those who had the knowledge and experience to undertake jobs in the oil and gas services, property, construction in mechanical, electrical and civil works, power supply, supply of timber and timber products and human capital training.
As such, he hoped that the private sector from Sarawak would be given opportunities to invest in Kazakshtan.
Other speakers at the seminar included Malaysian Ambassador to Republic of Kazakhstan Datuk Hidayat Abdul Hamid and Department of Enterprise Industry and Innovation, Almaty City, Kazakhstan vice director Adis Seidakhmatov.
Among those present were State Legislative Assembly speaker Datuk Amar Mohd Asfia Awang Nassar, Assistant Minister of Resource Planning Datuk Mohd Naroden Majais, Assistant Minister of Industrial Estate Development Datuk Peter Nansian Ngusie, Assistant Minister of Industrial Development ( Investment and Promotion) Datuk Julaihi Narawi, Assistant Minister of Environment Datu Len Talif Salleh, Industrial Committee of Ministry of Industries and Technology chairman His Excellency Bakhtybay Kasymbekov, and Republic of Kazakhstan Association of Entrepreneurs of Furniture and Timber Industry president Glukhov Mikhail Nikolayevich.