Advancing the Transfer of
Agricultural Technology & Research:
Malaysia’s Perspective
TRANSFORMATION OF A NATION
MALAYSIA’S ASPIRATIONS BY 2020
Basic Input Factors
 Land
 Labour
Basic Input Factors
 Infrastructure
 Collateralized riskfree capital
 Labour
Knowledge based Critical
Success Factors
 Creativity
 High-income
 Knowledge-economy
 Technology
 Market
TRANSFORMATION OF A NATION
MALAYSIA’S 4 PILLARS OF NATIONAL TRANSFORMATION
TRANSFORMATION OF A NATION
MAJOR GOALS
TRANSFORMATION OF A NATION
MALAYSIAN AGRICULTURE RESEARCH DEVELOPMENT INSTITUTE
Body entrusted by the Government of Malaysia to carry out R&D
in the Food and Agriculture and agriculture-based industry
Research focus:
 Cloning of food (rice, coco, cassava, sweet potatoes etc and non-food plant varieties,
New breed of animals),
 Food processing, post-harvest activities
 Other research areas include precision farming and Environmental sustainability.
Other activities:
Providing services to nurture agriculture and food related entrepreneurs
Product and services meeting standard Quality control
TRANSFORMATION OF A NATION
MARDI’S ACHIEVEMENTS
 More than 90% of Malaysia’s rice granary areas
developed by MARDI.
More than 30 rice varieties to fulfill the need of the nations.
(contribute to RM500 million per year income to farmers.
Develop technologies to export of pineapple and papaya
amounted to RM255 million a year.
48 Small and Medium Industries used MARDI technology with
the export amount of more than RM77M
TRANSFORMATION OF A NATION
FEDERAL AGRICULTURAL MARKETING AUTHORITY (FAMA)
•
A marketing agency which was established under Ministry of Agriculture and
Agro-Based Industry to monitor, coordinate, control and develop product
marketing of Malaysian agriculture, including import and export.
FAMA main function is :
• Coordinate agriculture marketing activity both in private
sector or department / government agency
• Improve marketing system and expand new market of
Malaysian agriculture development
• Collaborating with private sector and department /
government agency to create efficient and effective
agriculture marketing system
• Develop an efficient management in agriculture industry,
marketing activity or agricultural products processing
• Involve directly in agriculture industry, especially in
marketing activity and products processing.
TRANSFORMATION OF A NATION
CHALLENGES FACED BY MALAYSIA’S
AGRICULTURE SECTOR

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Increase crop productivity
Value added food products and foods
Emergence of new strains of pest and diseases
Development of new varieties and breeds
Food security
BIOTECHNOLOGY
COMPETITIVENESS
MEET THE CHALLENGES & IMPROVE
TRANSFORMATION OF A NATION
NATIONAL BIOTECHNOLOGY POLICY
VISION
Position biotechnology as the new economic engine to enhance prosperity
and wellness of the nation by 2020
OBJECTIVES
1. Generate new growth engine for the nation by creating
value that is competitive, innovative and consistent with
Vision 2020
2. Formulate the economic, legislative and regulatory
frameworks that will support core biotechnology sectors
3. Identify implementation strategies in order to establish
Malaysia as a competitive nation with leading edge
businesses
4. Develop biotechnology to enhance healthcare and medical
support for a better quality of life for all Malaysians
5. Extract greater value from agriculture and natural resources
by utilizing Malaysia’s unique biodiversity / natural
environment
TRANSFORMATION OF A NATION
MODERN AGRICULTURE TECHNOLOGY
Precision
Agriculture (ICT)
Modern Agriculture
Higher yield
Sustainability
Organic Farming
Crop rotation, Integrated
pest management
Mechanization / Automation
Nuclear
methods
(Mutagenesis)
Genetic Modification
Tempering Genetic trade
Bio-based Technology
TRANSFORMATION OF A NATION
Development Work at Agri-Biotechnology Institute (ABI)
R & D in AgroBiotechnology
Value add technologies
and products to agricultural
products
• New plant variety
• Transgenics plant
• Marker assisted selection
• Advance reproductive biotechnology
• Vaccine & diagnostics
Human capital development
Produce new, innovative and
competitive products &
technologies to market
• Biofertiliser & biopesticide
• Gene discovery
Plant
Biotechnology
Livestock
Biotechnology
• Metabolomics
• Bioinformatics
Food
Biotechnology
• Functional food
• Nano-biotechnology
• Food safety & security
TRANSFORMATION OF A NATION
ICT FOR AGRICULTURE
New Sources
of Growth
WSN Overview
New Ways of Doing Things:
1. Real Time information
2. Pervasive
3. Precise Information
4. Fast & Accurate information
For Better Quality of Life:
1. Life enrichment
2. Improve productivity
3. Enhance Security
4. Environment conservation
National Implementation
Program
Wireless Sensor
Network
(WSN)
TRANSFORMATION OF A NATION
PRECISION AGRICULTURE
Provide complete value chain from seed to shelf
in the agriculture sector
Spearheading application of ICT (Wireless
Sensor Network) in agriculture for yield
improvement
Establish portal Agribazaar for farmers to sell
their produce directly to avoid middle-man.
Automation of agriculture industry using decision
Support system
Portal for farmers to sell their products
ICT in agriculture for
productivity improvement
TRANSFORMATION OF A NATION
“SEED TO SHELF” AGRICULTURE SOLUTIONS
Precision Agriculture
Upstream
• Solving in-field variability
• Reduce input cost
• Reduce operation losses
Midstream
i-Logistic & AgriOffice
Downstream
• Reduce dependency on
middleman
• Order fulfilment, inventory and
logistics management, and
customer relationship
management (CRM)
AgriBazaar 2.0
• Virtual/Online retail business
24/7. Beyond brick and mortar
• Software as a Service (SaaS)
TRANSFORMATION OF A NATION
WIRELESS SENSOR FOR PLANT MONITORING: COMPLETE SOLUTION
Malaysia introduces Integrated
hardware solution:
To reduce implementation cost
Simple and easy for deployment
Communication Devices for
wireless agriculture data transmission
Environmental sensors –
Moisture, pH, Temperature and Chemical sensors.
Networked of Environmental Data Collection Components,
Communication Devices and Decision Support System to realise PA.
TRANSFORMATION OF A NATION
FISH FORECASTING THROUGH SATELLITE TECHNOLOGY
Increase in fuel cost, forces new method in the fishing industry
Fish forecasting predicts the location of fish in abundance
Make use of fish food (chlorophyl) and sea water
temperature from Satellite data.
Collaboration between the remote sensing agency and fish
development authority (LKIM)
Outcome:
9Millions USD save in diesel fuel permonth to fishermen
The fish search time reduced by 30% to give 20% increase in their income
TRANSFORMATION OF A NATION
NUCLEAR TECHNOLOGY FOR AGRICULTURE
Mutagenesis is a techniques to improves plant’s productivity using
nuclear technology
Low radiation level is applied to the seeds that causes it to
be pest/disease resistant, high yield, better taste and short gestation period.
It is proven to be safe and IAEA approved.
Nuclear Malaysia focuses on increasing the production of seed to cater for
Increased demand by the market
Bioreactor for growing young plants
TRANSFORMATION OF A NATION
Mutagenesis method used to improve
Banana and pineapple production/yield
Banana
Bearing fruit between 3 to 5 years
(cf 7-10 years for normal fruit)
Can produce 5000 new trees per month
High resistant to disease (Fusarium and
wilt)
Mutagenesis in biorector
Pineapple
Higher sugar content (15% higher)
Gestation period 3-5 years
(cf 7-10 years)
High resistant to diseases
Capacity in production ~10,000/month
TRANSFORMATION OF A NATION
1. Current State : Low- value herbal products
2.New Approach : Develop high value products from selected herbs
(NEW opportunities for farmers through contract farming)
Eurycoma longifolia
(Tongkat Ali)
Labisia Pumila
(Kacip Fatima)
Orthosiphon Stamineus
(Misai Kucing)
Phyllanthus Niruri
(Dukung Anak)
Some local herbals found to have medicinal value
Andrographis Paniculata
(Hempedu Bumi)
TRANSFORMATION OF A NATION
MDec Portal: e-pasartani@FAMA for farmers
Farmers/Consumers source commodities online from 278 Agri
Market sites at a lower price through Agriculture Delivery Channel
Registered farmers and trading farmers able to source market via esms@FAMA and increase profit margin by eliminating middle layers
Farming information can be viewed according to geographic
parameters
e-pasartani@FAMA uses MyKad-authenticated
information to generate demographic and geographic
data of traders.
These initiatives have enormously contributed in
commodities demand and supply matching, in particular
vegetables and fruit commodities.
Bukit Gambir
Kota Kinabalu
Scope of Transformation
Current Situation
After Transformation
Farm Size:
- Small
- Uneconomic
Large scale, commercial &
economic
Labour Force:
- Limited
- Ageing
Mechanization, automation &
technology
Less labour intensive activities
Farm management:
Professional, agriculture is
business,
- Traditional
- “satisfactory”
- “enough”
- Manual
Application of ICT, Commercial
management / collective /
economic of scale, Business
Plan
Scope of Transformation
Current Situation
After Transformation
Less / not competitive:
- Low product quality
- non-standard quality
- product dumping
- price factor
Standard, certification & export
quality
Return on Investment:
- Low
- Time consuming
Diversified returns:
Mixed farming, intercropping,
value added
TRANSFORMATION
Transformation of Traditional Farmers
Sectoral Transformation
- Land / farm size cluster
- Development based on zoning
-
- Private sector investment
- Investment incentives
- Implementation of Good
Practice Program (GAP)
Application of technology
Mechanisation
Productivity Agricultural
Supply-demand matching
marketing
farmer cooperation
diversity of economic activity
modernisation
Horizontal / Vertical Transformation
- Food processing
- Value added activities
- Supply chain activities
- By products
Thank You