The Economic Transformation of Malaysia part of part 3

Part 1
Part 2

I am directing  my attention  to rural economic transformation or traditional economy and less on urban economics or modern economy.

In a sense the attention is intentional because the income gap between rural and urban economy must never be allowed to widen.  It would lead to confrontation.

The rural problem, simply put is: How do we raise the nominal and real income of rural economic  actors?

We are already familiar  with price support and subsidy policies.  We should focus on economic and social policies.

People in rural areas are either self-employed or farmers as landowners or tenant farmers.

Some farmers cultivate government -owned lands.  They are frequently  raided by settlement  officers.

Tenant farming  should be abolished, tenant farmers should  be given lands. Those who open up government  owned lands should  be given lands, regularised in  size.

From here we can move on to the next  step  to help both the self-employed  and farmers.

But the transformation is not overnight. The individual farmer who railed over the minister of agricultural is expecting a quicksilver solution, the transformation of the rural economy of which agriculture is but a part requires time.  When it happened the individual farmer must seize the day and cannot expect to be spoon-fed.

Assuming the "challenge and respond" attitude is there, here are some measures which the government can facilitate.

I believed every district  should  have their own marketing premises, Alor Star has its Pekan Rabu, Kuala  Terengganu has it's Pasar Payang, Kota Baru it's Pasar Khatijah etc. The gov should build these in every district.

There, the rural economic actors can sell  their goods and services. Each premise should  have their own stage premises  to hold  cultural shows. That  would attract people  to come.

Farmers markets  should  be permanent premises. The premises should  have permanent  stalls. Refrigeration  facilities, toilet and prayer hall facilities  and rubbish Collection  facilities.

A previous  agriculture Minister, Ismail Sabri  I think, supplied 3 wheeled vehicles to farmers. I think this practice should be continued.  So is the supply of things  like coconut milk Extraction  machines and food-trucks.

Really it should  be the rural development ministry looking after these things because  of direct effects to rural folks

Certainly more pusat kemahiran should be built in the districts including vocational  training in agriculture

There must be institutions that promote growth!