Abang Johari (second right) officiated the symbolic opening of BioSFE 2023 which took place in Kuching for three days until September 27. - Picture by Roystein Emmor
KUCHING: The Sarawak government will provide a special fund to attract the educated young generation to be seriously involved in the agriculture and food sector using new technology.
Sarawak Premier Datuk Patinggi Tan Sri Abang Johari Tun Openg said he has seven more years for Sarawak to achieve its goal of becoming a permanent exporter of food by 2030.
"I have seven years left to 2030 and I have already started with all the universities where if there are students who take a program based on food, they will be placed in Taman Agro when they finish their studies so that they can produce food according to new technology.
"We have an Agro Park in Sarikei, Kuching and many more Agro Parks will be developed into industrial parks to accommodate the young generation with expertise.
"That's why there must be a special fund to help them because without capital it's difficult, high risk and wait two months for me to announce," he said.
He said this at a press conference after officiating the First International Conference on Biotechnology, Smart Agriculture and Entrepreneurship for Food Security (BioSFE) 2023 at a hotel here, today.
The conference was organized by Universiti Teknologi MARA (UiTM) Sarawak Branch together with the Ministry of Food Industry, Commodity and Regional Development and National Chung Cheng University.
In a related development, Abang Johari said Sarawak is considering changing the name of its Agriculture Department to food industry.
He said our changes need to be made to allow Sarawak to focus more on developing its food industry.
"This is my personal view, because 'agriculture' is two words that are farm culture into one and we want to change it a little so that we produce better farm managers.
"We will first discuss whether the time is right to change the Department of Agriculture to the food industry," he said.
Regarding the conference, Abang Johari said it is a conference that will provide input and new ideas to the government to increase the value of raw materials for the food industry in the state.
Sarawak's desire, he said, is to become a regular exporter of food in 2030 to foreign countries, especially China, India and countries in ASEAN.
Abang Johari said that Sarawak has several strengths, firstly its population is small at only 2.8 million people and it has a lot of room to develop its economy, especially the food sector.
Therefore, he congratulated UiTM and the Ministry of Food Industry, Commodities and Regional Development for being able to bring experts from a technology point of view, adding value to existing materials and food safety. Also present were the Minister of Food Industry, Commodities and Regional Development Dato Sri Dr Stephen Rundi Utom and his Deputy Martin Ben, Deputy State Government Secretary (Operations) Datu Hii Chang Kee and Rector of UiTM Sarawak Branch Professor Dato Dr Jamil Hamali.
