KUCHING: The state government wants to see more technical experts in the agriculture industry to increase Sarawak’s self-sufficiency in various types of produce.
According to Deputy Chief Minister Datuk Amar Douglas Uggah Embas, presently the majority of officers involved in the extension programme are ‘generalists who are expected to know all’ – in which case, it is sometimes difficult for them to give professional advice.
As such, he has directed the relevant authorities to review the current extension programme, which aims at giving advice to smallholding farmers in the rural areas.
“I’m now directing the Agriculture Institute of Sarawak (IPS) to relook at their syllabus and how to build up technical people. For example, if a farmer wants to know how to take care of his durian trees, then we would have the technical people who know from A to Z, the diseases and the fertilisers that are good for durian trees.
“In other words, towards the end of the course, we want them to specialise in a particular area,” he told reporters after launching the 12th convocation of IPS at the institute near here yesterday.
Uggah, who is also Minister of Modernisation of Agriculture, Native Land and Regional Development, said the state is in need of artificial exponentiation services for livestock such as cattle and goat, which are now breeding at natural phase.
“We are moving very slow; that’s why our self-sufficiency is very low – 10 per cent for cattle and seven per cent for goat.
“If you continue to follow the nature’s way of growing, it would be very slow. So we want to build up a team of technical people to go into artificial exponentiation,” he said.
Uggah added that Sarawak relies on imports from Australia and India – a situation which leads to high prices ‘because we do not have enough stock of our own’. He pointed out that the production of livestock could be scheduled through artificial exponentiation.
“If you go to some big farms, they are doing it (artificial exponentiation). That’s why we need technical people on the ground to teach our smallholding farmers.”
Uggah expressed hope that such a move would help farmers modernise and increase productivity so as to produce quality products and eventually, for them to earn more income.
In response to a question, Uggah said the IPS has two-year courses which award certificates ‘that are very general’.
“Now they have two years. The question is whether we want to extend another one year. Maybe the second or third year (would be) into a specialist field,” he said, believing that the IPS graduates should be able to get jobs ‘if they’re not very choosy’.
“They can go into the agriculture industry, go into business. A lot of them have land and so on. With digital economy and the Internet, agriculture will become modern and interesting. I hope this would attract the young people into the industry,” he added.