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Please Have A Comprehensive Survey Of Over 14,000 SMIs IN Malaysia Summary of the speech by Dr Tan Seng Giaw, DAP National Vice-Chairman and MP for Kepong in Parliament on 11 April 2000. | |||||||
| The 2000 budget for Enterpreneur Development Ministry is about RM2.1 billion. This should be used effectively to promote self-reliant entrepreneurs. Although a portion of the money will go to help Malays and others, Bumiputras, the Ministry should also ensure that there are opportunities for all races. With the advent of globalisation, the small and medium industries, SMIs, are facing even bigger problems. It seems that there are over 14,000 SMIs in Malaysia. In the past 34 months of economic crisis, a few have gone donwn. Many survive, especialy those which are exporting their goods. They are able to make the best of the lower Ringgit value. Globalisation is making life more complicated. We all have to change. Entrepreneurs have to be more enterprising to grapple with the need for domestic and international markets, the use of higher technology, information technology, skilled workers and better environment. Both International Trade and Industry and Entrepreneur Development Ministries are dealing with SMIs and entrepreneurs. SMI Development Corporation, SMIDEC, are having various | |
schemes to help SMIs such as Induatrial Technical Asistance Fund, ITAF, Modernisation and Automation Scheme, MAS, Quality Enhancement Scheme, QES, Financial Package for SMIs, Paksi, Factory Auditing, FA, shceme and Graduate Entrepreneur Fund. The allocation for these is RM350 million. Apparently, there are 3,193 applicants from the schemes amounting to RM323 milion. The ministries tend to blame SMIs for their lack of response to multitude of incentives. Many do not have the criteria required by SMIDEC. For example, under ITAF, 28.5 percent of the applications were rejected because they did not conform with the criteria and 44.2 percent of the applicatons were returned as these were not properly filled. We do not know the actual figure of SMIs in the country. We do know that there are many problems and groans from the ministries. Instead of just blaming the SMIs, we propose that the Government carry out a comprehensive survey of the SMIs, finding out their strength and weakness, short- and long-term solutions so that they can take their rightful place in the modern world.
Dr Tan Seng Giaw | |||||
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