comments of Yang di-Pertuan Agong's speech

Translated by J.T.

Yesterday was the first day of the parliamentary session for 2009, as usual; Yang di-Pertuan Agong will make comprehensive review on the country’s prospect and policy. It is said that current year's speech has done by Yang di-Pertuan Agong personally, compare to previous years, just as the ruling Government's rubber seal, and just simply read a prepared speech.

It was something that encouraging, because in 308 elections, the royal families in the country seem to be more active than before to participate in handling national issues. At the same time, they also express their views on the economic crisis in the country.

In spite of this, when I read the Yang di-Pertuan Agong's speech, I feel that overall, there were lack of sufficient energetic steps to overcome critical problems, especially in handling current world economic recession issues.

When the supplies overflow causing the price of the raw materials to plummet, why does the government just concentrate on helping FELDA to develop their agricultural lands? Instead, they should have provided their help to the whole agriculture field. This is due to the fact that this field has faced some crisis due to the uprising price of the fuel. The cost for agriculture has increased significantly following the increase in the price of the fuel. When the price for the raw materials was good, farmers can cover these costs. However, in the current situation, many farmers have failed to do so. This crisis does not only happen in the Federal developed- land but it is a nationwide problem for the whole agriculture field. As a country which relies mostly on exporting agricultural products, Malaysia has faced some detrimental results following this crisis. Our country is always affected by the international original product price volatility. For example, rubber, Malaysia was once the world's largest rubber exporting country, but when these advantages as the world of futures trading are disrupted, leading to the eighties gum Park Hill to be abandoned. The same situation has also happened in stannum industry. Our country is blessed with fertilized soils and good weather and it should concentrate on developing the agriculture field. However, due to the overly ambitious visions of our former Prime Minister, Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad, our country has failed to supply sufficient food for its people and to control the price of agriculture products in the global market.

For this moment, Government seems not to carry out remedial and upgrading for our country agricultural sector. A country agricultural achievements start from research and development of value add products for originating product, but our country’s agricultural development agencies did not do their job well. In contrast, Taiwan, previously a backward agricultural nation and later developed into a high-tech industries in Southeast Asia's leading exporting countries. Talented peoples and R&D were the key of success. Numerous of agricultural development agencies such as: Malaysia Agricultural Research Development Council (MARDI), Pahang Eastern Development Council (DARA), Muda Agricultural Development Authority (MADA)which has established due to the implementation of New Economy Policy (DEB)fail to bring changes. The main reason was the Barisan National which led by Umno do no use of talented peoples, operation lack of transparency and lack of responsible. To bring up our country’s agricultural sector, there must be a clear direction moving towards high-tech,that was also the only way to make sure our country has competitive advantages in agricultural sector.

If the Government is far-sighted, Government should boost spending on agricultural sector and the establishment of a clear direction on how to develop the sector rather than abuse of taxpayer’s money. Furthermore they should try their best to bring a restructuring reform of agriculture system. Agriculture system reform will enable us to stay afloat during the recession. The reasons are many crops are suitable to plant in our country. Government should focus on these developments rather than just provide subsidies in certain area, and overlook a longer term national developments.

Today Barisan National has successfully taken over the Perak state, but will the policies regarding the ownership of land be continued, or abolished. This will let us know whether Barisan National has the intention of solving the crisis faced by our agriculture field.