Aquaculture Projects – Northern Corridor (NCER)
Objectives of the first phase of the Northern Corridor (NCER) or Koridor Utara’s was development that would accelerate economic growth by developing key thrust areas, addressing socio-economic imbalances, raising the capacity for knowledge, improving the quality of life and strengthening institutional and implementation capacity. This Phase attracted some RM12.3 billion in private sector participation and created 16,335 job and business opportunities in 2012 alone.
The second phase which spans from 2013 to 2020 is tailored towards broadening the role of the private sector in the economic development of the NCER.
To move forward key questions will need to be answered, how will the region fostering a strong innovation environment and can the diversifying the economy by leveraging on core clusters create the catalyse for economic growth by encouraging private sector participation and enhancing the support eco-system?
As the country continues to deal with the challenges of food security the Malaysia Global Business Forum looks at the Agriculture sector in the NCER as a key element of success.
According to the NCER’s vision for the agriculture sector, it “will be revitalised to fulfill domestic demands and exports. In doing this, we will not only raise the output of the agricultural sector, but will concurrently elevate the living standards of farming communities, alleviating them from poverty”.
“We are positioning NCER to be a modern food zone; and we are aim to achieve this by modernising current farming technique and promoting the youths by technology to take agriculture to the next level. An integrated support system has been put in place; and with this being augmented by the presence of the NCIA biotech centre and the plant science and tissue culture node, the private sector can be assured of a full fledge support infrastructure”.
Should the goals be reached the region will be leading the transformation of Malaysia’s agriculture sectors, by adopting commercial-scale farming and implementing the latest technologies into their activities.
One area that has been ear marked for intensive development is the Sungai Menghulu. The Sungai Menghulu Aquaculture programme is a programme that revolves around the farming of marine fishes in cages. This programme is intended to produce 32 aquaculture entrepreneurs mainly for the farming of Groupers and create 96 job opportunities for the local community. This programme is expected to increase the nation’s fish yield by as much as 960 MT, which is valued at RM28 million per annum.
“The building of an administrative office, fish-feed processing centre, quarantine centre and a nursery has been fully completed and all are in operation. As of now, this initiative has directly created 16 entrepreneurs and employs 57 workers. Moreover this has provided the opportunity for local fishermen to earn a decent living by supplying fertiliser fish which in the past had no value and were simply disposed off”.
Moving forward with the goal of increasing exports of premium, fresh and processed agriculture products and assisting Malaysia in its food self-sufficiency objectives in staple foods such as rice, cultivating new commercial crops and promoting downstream activities in the agriculture sector such as projects like the Aquaculture & Fisheries Industry Development Centre in an important step in the development of Food Security in Malaysia.
