KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysia must address the remuneration and salary of engineers, said Deputy Prime Minister Datuk Seri Fadillah Yusof.
He said Malaysia’s engineer to population ratio of 1:170, is significantly lower than the 1:100 ratio prevalent in developed nations and this is rather concerning.
“As we analyse the reasons behind this disparity, we must address the remuneration and salary component so that we can attract more students to take up engineering in their tertiary education. As you may all be aware, based on reports received, 35% of junior engineers earn below RM2,000 per month,” he said in his speech at the opening ceremony of Engineer & Marvex 2024 today.
Additionally, he said, there is a need to reflect on the educational landscape which currently has only about 45% of Malaysian students pursuing fields related to STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics), falling short of the 60% target set by the Malaysian Education Blueprint 2013-2025.
“Realising this shortcomings, the government is actively promoting STEM through initiatives like the Techlympics and National Science Week which aims to cultivate increased interest in science and technology by 2030.
“I was also made aware that IEM (Institution of Engineers Malaysia) has been a strong advocate and supporter of these two programmes which I am appreciative of the efforts made by the IEM volunteers,” he said.
Fadillah said that the New Industrial Master Plan 2030 which aims to transform Malaysia into a hi-tech industrialised nation, supported by four key enablers – financing, talent development, investor journey, and governance – a strategic move to be embraced and operational use for the nation’s socio-economic wellbeing.
A significant step to achieve this, he said, is establishing Southeast Asia’s largest integrated circuit design park in moving beyond the back-end chip assembly towards high-value front-end design that benefits the whole supply chain.
“As such, I believe Engineer and Marvex can serve as crucial platforms in mobilising our aspirations and showcasing Malaysia as technology competencies in producing a skilled workforce,” Fadillah said.
He also said that an area that excites him in the event is on the latest in M&E and ACMV&R products and solutions for the development of live data centre infrastructure and clean room facilities.
“As you may have read from news reports, Malaysia is poised to become Asia’s third-largest market for data centres, trailing only Japan and India,” he said, adding that this growth is fuelled by the surging demand for cloud computing, artificial intelligence, and e-commerce, with major global players like AWS, Microsoft and Google, investing heavily in this region.
“The strategic location, favourable government policies, and competitive costs for land and utilities makes Malaysia an attractive destination for data centres which is recognised as the fastest-growing data centre market in Southeast Asia,” he said.
The four-day event from Sept 18-21 at the Kuala Lumpur Convention Centre will showcase engineering technologies with a focus on innovation, sustainability, and ESG principles.
