Mida may liberalise subsectors of services

31 March 2010 , By The Star

MALAYSIAN Industrial Development Authority (Mida), which is expected to be corporatised latest by August and renamed Malaysian Investment Development Authority, is studying the possibility of liberalising several subsectors within the services segment to encourage more investments.

Its director-general Datuk Jalilah Baba said the sectors would be those that investors were “keen on”.

“My personal hope is that we can complete the (liberalisation) by year-end so that more investments can come in,” she told a press conference in conjunction with the Invest Malaysia conference here yesterday.

While she declined to elaborate on the sectors, it is understood that they include the healthcare travel (medical tourism) and environmental management sectors – both areas the government agency responsible for the country’s manufacturing and services investments, has identified as new areas of growth.

As for the agency’s corporatisation exercise, Jalilah said it was still at the early stages of planning.

“We’ve just got the news, I realise that three to four months (to complete the corporatisation) is an ambitious plan but we will work hard with all relevant parties to move towards it,” she said.

Jalilah said no cost had been allocated for the exercise yet but “it should not be too expensive”. “We have good advisers,” she said.

Asked whether more advisers, especially foreign ones would be engaged to help with the new exercise, she said Mida was studying options.

“It doesn’t mean we will engage them, there are many ways to work together,” she said.

Jalilah said with the new agency where decision making should be quicker, she was targeting a higher level of investment from both the services and manufacturing segments.

“We are targeting up to RM40bil for the services and up to RM48bil for the manufacturing segment this year,” she said. Earlier, Mida had targeted RM27.5bil for the services segment and up to RM45bil for the manufacturing segment.

As for the structure of Mida post-corporatisation, Jalilah said the aim was for a “lean” organisation.

“Employees would be given an option. For those who choose to stay, I will re-interview them,” she said, without elaborating. Mida has collectively about 800 employees worldwide, according to her.

As for her own position, she said “I would still be number one”.

Earlier in his speech, Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak said Mida’s corporatisation exercise would allow the agency to obtain organisational flexibility in attracting and retaining the manpower and talents it needed to be an internationally competitive national investment promotion agency.

“The Government has also agreed to empower Mida with the necessary authority to negotiate directly with investors for targeted projects,” he said.

Najib said Mida would also be designated as the central investment promotion agency for the manufacturing and services sector excluding utilities and financial services to boost cohesion among the various investment promotion bodies in the country.