Sarawak: Education to the fore

The announcement in early February that a major new fund for training and education has been established for Sarawak has given a welcome boost to the state’s long-term development plans. Sarawak is now seeing the fruit of a wide range of educational initiatives as the state, and the nation as a whole, prepares for the year 2020. By then – if the government’s long-range plans bear fruit – Malaysia, and Sarawak along with it, will have attained high-income nation status. Getting there – and indeed, meeting the human resources requirements of programmes such as as the Sarawak Corridor of Renewable Energy (SCORE), which is already in high gear – requires that the state’s labour force play catch-up in attaining a wide variety of new skills. The announcement on February 11 that a new RM500 million (US$164.1 million) state fund was being set up to promote vocational and technical study was a key part of a wider effort to provide Sarawak’s workers with targeted training. The fund, Tabung Ekonomi Gagasan Anak Sarawak (Tegas), would be offi cially launched by Sarawak’s chief minister, Pehin Sri Abdul Taib Mahmud, on February 28. Tegas is thus a state initiative aimed at promoting technical skills training and raising public awareness of vocational training. The president of the Sarawak Private Institutions of Higher Learning Association (Perintis), Baharudin Abdullah, told the local press on February 11 that the scheme would also provide a good career path for those choosing to follow less academic studies. “It should not mean that if you do not have a degree you cannot have a good career,” Baharudin told reporters. “With vocational and technical skills, you can even earn more than those with degrees. It is very important for youngsters to equip themselves with certain skills to help them get a job and earn a better living.” In the same vein, on February 9 the Sarawak Skills Development Centre (PPKS) and India’s B S Abdur Rahman University signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) to broaden Sarawak’s base of skilled talent. Baharudin, who is also the executive director of the PPKS, said the MoU would enable close cooperation between PPKS and Chennai-based B S Abdur Rahman University, including skills development and academic, personnel and cultural transfers between the two institutions. “In the 21st century, higher learning institutions seem to continue retaining a very important position as ‘brain factories’,” Baharudin said at the signing ceremony. “For that matter, the spirit of this MoU can be a platform for pooling intellectual resources and providing a fruitful exchange of new ideas for both institutions.” Baharudin said he expected the cooperation to help PPKS consolidate its standing as one of the leaders in providing technical education to working adults as well as people who have left school before graduating. Established in 1994, PPKS has to date trained 33,000 graduates, threequarters of who have joined the workforce. The minister of industrial development, Datuk Amar Awang Tengah Ali Hassan, also added that at the state level, the MoU would assist in producing the skilled workforce required for SCORE. “No economy can succeed without a highly skilled talent base that is able to rapidly respond to economic changes, which is centred on developing and utilising knowledge,” Awang Tengah said. “To achieve Malaysia’s aspiration to catch up with a first-world skill and talent base by the year 2020, it is imperative to develop, attract and retain a first-world talent base.” The Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission (MCMC) was taking a step in just this direction. In January, it announced it had allocated RM5 million (US$1.6 million) grant for content providers in Sarawak’s creative industries. The allocation, made in cooperation with the government’s offi cial broadcaster, Radio Television Malaysia (RTM), was part of the MCMC’s Creative Industry Development Fund (CIDF). Boosting the content provision industry in Sarawak could create jobs for actors, technical crew, scriptwriters and equipment suppliers, said Datuk Mohd Nazri Abdullah, the special functions officer to the information, communications and culture minister, Datuk Seri Utama Rais Yatim. Speaking at a signing event between the MCMC and content providers for the TVi programme on January 9, Nazri said the CIDF grant would enable content providers in Sarawak to compete with their counterparts in Peninsular Malaysia to create innovative programming such as documentaries, drama series and animated content for TVi. TVi, RTM’s newest channel, is lining up programming tailored to viewers in Sarawak and Sabah, with production houses in both states gearing up to deliver the new content after receiving the grant from MCMC. Combined with the array of other education-related programmes now available in the state – such as the cooperation with B S Abdur Rahman University and the push for more vocational training – this could prove to be a winning combination for Sarawak’s workforce and economy, come 2020.