KUALA LUMPUR: This year saw the MADANI Government riding a wave of successes through an economic boom, propelled by hard work throughout 2024 for the benefit of the people and country.
Among the key initiatives highlighted was the New Industrial Master Plan 2023 (NIMP 2030), which lays out a clear action plan over seven years, focusing on strategic investment, workforce development and a R&D culture for high-tech industries, with a vision to transform Malaysia into a high-income developed country by 2030.
According to a provost of Malaysia University of Science and Technology (MUST), Prof Emeritus Dr Barjoyai Bardai, the implementation of NIMP 2030 as of the second quarter of 2024 continued to bear fruit with various important achievements recorded, including a 0.9 per cent increase in employment opportunities.
He said the 200,000 new job opportunities created were able to strengthen Malaysia’s position as an employment hub in the high-tech sector.
“Certainly, new jobs help the people but we need to be prepared for changes in the employment sector where employers and industries are focused on semi-skilled and skilled workers in line with the government’s efforts to migrate to an artificial intelligence (AI) and digital economy.
“We have more than 17 million workers and 70 pct of them are unskilled and need training immediately, whereupon this also sends an important signal to the Human Resources Development Corporation Berhad (HRDF Corp) that it needs to invest more to improve the skills of these workers,” he told Bernama.
For more added value, the MADANI Government has also proven its commitment to developing highly qualified human capital, in line with the needs of modern industry with 1,057 technical experts having received training.
Barjoyai said this was a bold initial step by the government led by Prime Minister Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim to send a group of national workers for training, thus upskilling local workers.
“In fact, we need to be quicker in sending our workers to undergo training for a month or three months through micro-credentials offered at higher learning institutions, particularly in AI and big data courses,“ he said.
Geo-strategist Prof Dr Azmi Hassan said that among the significant achievements of the MADANI Government this year can be seen through the total distribution of income from the Amanah Saham Bumiputera (ASB) of 5.75 sen which was announced on Dec 24.
In fact, he said that the increasingly strong position of the ringgit against the USD also reflects economic stability and foreign investor confidence in this country because the MADANI Government has succeeded in creating political stability throughout its more than two years of administration.
“This political stability reflects that investors have confidence in a strong economic structure, so the encouraging ASB dividend and the strengthening position of the ringgit are due to political stability.
“So I see this as a gift from the MADANI Government to the people of Malaysia because since 2018 ... political stability (in Malaysia) has been quite shaky,” he said when contacted by Bernama.
The Senior Fellow of the Nusantara Strategic Research Academy said that when the country achieves political stability to drive longer term prosperity, the Cabinet can focus all its attention on forming policies for the benefit of the people such as the progress of NIMP 2030, which among other things aims to increase job opportunities.
“NIMP is more focused on increasing job opportunities and is like technical training because the prime minister emphasised in his MADANI concept to prioritise new and latest technologies in economic development, which is why it is stated that every citizen must understand what is meant by artificial intelligence,” he said, as 2025 will see the MADANI Government pursue greater ASEAN integration to drum up domestic investments.
