Senior William Rade
SERIAN: The state Farmers Organisation (FO) should be given the opportunity to manage the Serian collection and processing centre for durians and other agricultural produce which is proposed to be built in Tarat.
Serian Area Farmers Organisation (AFO) member and former Serian District Council councillor Senior William Rade said he believed the FO has the advantage to be the anchor organisation to lead manage the project as they have the capability, expertise and manpower.
“FO is the catalyst of rural development especially anything related to agriculture. Thus, FO must be allowed and to be seen as an anchor organisation to spearhead and be at the forefront to lead the farming community engaged in large agricultural projects for long lasting benefits of the farmers.
“This will definitely encourage the younger generation to take farming as a career,” he said yesterday.
He was commenting on the announcement by Deputy Chief Minister Datuk Amar Douglas Uggah Embas on Sept 3 that the collection and processing centre for durians and other agricultural produce in Serian would be built in Tarat.
Uggah, also the Modernisation of Agriculture, Native Land and Regional Development Minister, was quoted as saying the government was in a discussion with a potential anchor company to run the centre by end of this year, to enable the collection and processing of durians to be exported overseas.
The company invited to run this centre was reported to have over 30 years’ worth of experience and is considered an expert in durian processing, having already exported durian-based products to six countries.
Senior said the proposed centre is good news and definitely augers well for the farming community and hoped it would increase sales and improve their income.
He urged the Ministry of Modernisation of Agriculture, Native Land and Regional Development, in collaboration with the Department of Agriculture, to look into the possibility to construct more agricultural roads in the rural areas where the sizeable numbers of FO members are located.
“With more agricultural roads constructed the farmers will be able to transport their produce to the collection and processing centre and other areas promptly,” he said.
He noted there are about 168,000 thousand farm families who are registered with FO and the number is increasing yearly.
“Any government funded projects be it in the field of agriculture big or small undertaken by FO will at the end of the day benefit its members in the respective AFO. As of today there are 28 registered AFOs in the state,” he said.
He believed this arrangement will ultimately allow the government to achieve its main objective to increase the rural household income to at least RM4,000 per month by the year 2020.
“Incomes or profits earned by FO if any will be ploughed back to its registered members through the respective AFO in the form of bonus and dividends without fail every year. The income will also allow FO to carry out its corporate social responsibility(CSR) especially in looking after the welfare and wellbeing of its registered member families,” he said.