TUDAN (Kiulu): Sabah Tourism Board chairman Datuk Joniston Bangkuai has suggested the establishment of sisterhood pact between strategic rural villages in Sabah and Japan.
He said such a sisterhood pact would allow greater people-to-people interaction and cooperation between Sabah and Japan, especially involving rural folks.
In an immediate reaction, Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) chief representative in Malaysia, Kojiro Matsumoto, said the proposal is worth looking into.
“We are always ready to explore any new initiative that could further enhance the existing close people-to-people ties between Japan and Sabah,” Matsumoto said.
Speaking at the closing of a JICA-SDBEC pilot project on sustainable agriculture and ecosystem protection here, Joniston also noted that fostering people-to-people cooperation and understanding is the main objective of JICA
Supporting the proposal, a local from Tudan, Jenius Gadiman, went a step further by suggesting a sisterhood pact between Tudan and Toyooka, a rural village about 400km from Tokyo.
Gadiman, a teacher, who was selected for a three-week familiarisation visit to Japan last year under the auspices of JICA, said he had the opportunity of touring Toyooka and noticed that the village has some similarity with Tudan in the aspect of agro-tourism.
“Toyooka, though a rural village, is more advance in the agro-tourism development than Tudan, but we are not that far behind,” he said, adding that the people from the two villages have much to learn from each other which would be made possible through a sisterhood pact.
Tudan is a rural village nestled on the slopes of a valley along the crocker range about 60km from Kota Kinabalu.
On the JICA-SDBEC project, Joniston, who is also Kiulu assemblyman, believes that its impact in the long run is enormous in terms of economically empowering the people of Tudan.
The four-year pilot project, among others, involves mullberry cultivation and bee keeping which has begun to bring economic benefits to the rural community.
“Some of us have started to produce various mullbery-based products, such as wine and tea,” said Tudan Village Community Development and Security Committee chairperson Emmelyice Sirinus.
A community cooperative has been set up with the help of Universiti Malaysia Sabah, a key driver in the implementation of the pilot project, to market the village agro-tourism products.