ON A SERIOUS NOTE: Youth and Sports and Solidarity Minister Dato Sri Michael Jawong (left) appears to be having a serious discussion with Industrial and Entrepreneur Development, Trade and Investment Minister Datuk Amar Awang Tengah Ali Hassan at the DUN complex.
SARAWAK may see a drop in income from the export of its wood products to RM6 billion by the year-end, from the projected RM6.6 billion.
Second Resource Planning and Environment Minister Datuk Amar Awang Tengah Ali Hasan said the decline was expected in view of the global economic slowdown.
According to him, between January and September this year, the state’s export value of wood products exhibited a downward trend of 9.6 per cent to RM4.42 billion, from RM4.89 billion recorded in the same period last year.
He said this was attributable to the reduction in the export of wood products following lower demands from the major importers like Japan, India, Taiwan and China.
“For logs and plywood, the export value has dropped by 19 per cent and 12 per cent respectively during the period of January and September this year.
“The export value for logs went down to RM1.1 billion from RM1.36 billion, while the export value for plywood dropped to RM2.15 billion from RM2.43 billion previously,” he said in his ministerial winding-up speech.
Japan remained the top key market of Sarawak wood products at 38 per cent, followed by India (18 per cent), South Korea, Taiwan and Middle East countries (nine per cent each), and the Philippines (three per cent).
Awang Tengah said the state government would strive to strengthen the demand of wood products from Sarawak in the international market through international promotional programmes.
He said aside from this, the state government continued to empower wood-based downstream industries by having reduced the export quota of logs from 40 per cent to 30 per cent, effective July 2016.
He said the percentage of log exports would be reviewed from time to time to ensure sustainable supply of local wood-based downstream industries.
“The setup of the RM5 million research and development centre will help the state government to improve the development of wood-based downstream industries,” he said.