KUALA LUMPUR, Jan 19 — The most crucial precondition for Malaysia at the moment is political stability so as to move forward effectively, said the Sultan of Perak Sultan Nazrin Shah.
His Royal Highness said political stability will allow planners to focus more fully on the longer term and put into place the policies and measures that are necessary to build confidence among investors.
“Further strengthening of our institutions is thus another priority, as it is these which will ensure the effective implementation of the various policies that will propel us forward,” Sultan Nazrin said when launching the book Malaysia’s Leap Into The Future: The Building Blocks Towards Balanced Development at the Asia-Europe Institute, Universiti Malaya, earlier today.
His Royal Highness said Malaysia has strong institutional foundations in many respects and needs to muster the political will to drive the nation’s institutions forward in a progressive way.
The country must find alternative means to prosper, bringing in fresh approaches such as that of the circular ‘doughnut’, or ‘mission’ economy, to build economies that work for the planet as well as its inhabitants.
Sultan Nazrin said the nation’s developmental model must also be genuinely inclusive as the approach in areas from education and human capital development to poverty and inequality must entail the inclusion of all Malaysians, irrespective of ethnicity and religion.
“We are all equally part of Malaysia’s success – in the present and past – as we have built our shared prosperity together; and into the future, as we meet its complex challenges together,” His Royal Highness said.
Describing the book, Sultan Nazrin said its ultimate focus was on ways to promote the structural changes that are necessary in order to boost and sustain our economic growth, covering topics from the implications of our current population characteristics and projected demographic change to the financing of economic development.
“It considers the necessary transformations that must take place in the agricultural sector to strengthen our food security, and those that are required in the manufacturing and services sectors to ensure we keep up with technological and other changes,” His Royal Highness said.
The book’s editors are Universiti Malaya’s professors of economics Prof Rajah Rasiah, the late Prof Cheong Kee Cheok and Tan Sri Kamal Salih.
— Bernama
