THE government is in the midst of identifying potential areas to be developed into commercial agro-food production areas in Pelagus and Baleh constituencies.
Martin Ben (GPS-Kedup) said this in response to Wilson Nyabong Ijang (GPS-Pelagus) in the question-and-answer session during the 19th Sarawak Legislative Assembly (DUN) sitting on Thursday (Nov 24).
Martin, who is also Deputy Minister for Food Industry, Commodity and Regional Development, added that based on the suitability and topography of the land in the areas, the crops that had potential included durian, dabai and grain corn.
“The proposed business model to be introduced to develop the agricultural sector commercially in Pelagus will be through Public-Private-Community Partnership (PPCP).
“The implementation of this model involves a mutual agreement between farmers and the leading company, based on a rental approach and contract farming where the farmers’ right to land ownership remains intact and is not affected.
“Other than that, the leading company will also bear the management capital and manage the cultivation and marketing of agricultural products.”
When asked on the method used by the Sarawak Department of Agriculture to distribute agricultural assistance quotas to each division in the state, Martin pointed out that this was based on the applications received and the quota was also based on suitability, type of crop as well as the amount of allocation.
He revealed that for projects under the 11th Malaysia Plan (11MP) from 2016 to 2020, the government had allocated RM526,000 to 64 participants in Pelagus – RM478,500 being federal funds and RM40,500 being state funds.
“Meanwhile, from 2019 to 2020, Pelagus received RM1.78mil in assistance involving 2,310 participants and programmes involving crops and livestock.
“Last year, a sum of RM56,500 was channelled through to a total of seven participants.”
