Wawasan Brunei 2035 and National Development Plan 2007-2012

I have not read Wawasan Brunei 2035 (Brunei Vision 2035) nor the new National Development Plan (Rancangan Kemajuan Negara - RKN), which for some reason was not called the ninth. Hence, I cannot really make a lot of comments on the contents of these 2 national books. For everyone’s benefits, there are 3 main objectives to achieve Brunei Vision 2035 and these are:

1) Brunei to be recognized as a highly educated and skilled people;
2) To have a quality of life among 10 top nations in the world; and
3) To be among the top 10 GDP per capita income nations in the world.

I have found some interesting reads regarding Wawasan 2035 including a presentation made by Dr Richard Leete at the Brunei Forum in Singapore and an article featured in the economist.

The most interesting paper I came across however was a paper by Brunei’s National Development Party which can be found here. The 17 page paper, written in malay, highlights a few weaknesses of the new RKN and gives some proposals for improvements. Among the key points are (pardon my poor translation):

1) The new RKN lacks a comprehensive planning structure: For instance it does not show the specific sectors to be developed and their projected contribution to the economic growth. It also does not address the demand and supply aspects of economic development which will give a more realistic picture;

2) The use of GDP per-capita as the measurement of quality of life will not give a true picture. The GDP per-capita is not a measure of income equality. A greater income equality will ensure a higher quality of life. The Plan however does not address the issue of income equality;

3) The lack of detailed data to support some of the strategy such as the reduction of foreign labour dependence;

4) The lack of strategies to achieve some of the human resource development objectives;

5) The Plan does not explain the method of the calculation of the multiplier effect, which will be used as the basis of project selection.

From my point of view, those points are valid, economically sound and definitely not some mere criticism. What they have raised in that paper are very important and should be taken seriously by the relevant policy-makers in ensuring the successful implementation of the current and any future RKN.

Salaam.

National Development Plans: Summary1

I am going to share with you the finding of a little exercise I did at the beginning of my research. After reading all of Brunei’s National Development Plans, cover to cover, I made a matrix (which I must say is not an easy exercise!) of each RKN/NDP’s objectives, strategies, finance allocations and the targeted economic projects/industries to be developed.

Today, I am going to show you the list of targeted industries/projects beginning from the third National Development Plan (as the first two mere talked about physical infrastructure). The aim of this is to sort of reflect, remind ourselves and see how far we have gone to achieve any of the targeted projects. If we have, how successful was it? If we haven’t then the question we should ask is why? (Unfortunately I do not have the data to measure the achievements).

NOTE: ALL of these can be found in the published National Development Plans!

(Apology for the untidy presentation and BEST VIEWED using FireFox!)

3rd NDP (1975-79)
1. Rice production
2. Agriculture: sweet corn, yellow beans and high protein cattle grass.
3. Livestock: meat and eggs.
4. Castor oil plant
5. Tree crops: pineapple plantations and palm oil estates
6. Fisheries: marine fish
7. Forestry: establishment of a Kraft Pulp Paper Mill and a timber complex.
8. Other mineral resources: development of gravel in Temburong, silica sand in Tutong and coastal terrace clay and ceramic clay in Jerudong.
9. Tourism: Construction of hotels.
10. Oil and gas: Ammonia and Urea plants
Agro based industry: sago processing plant

4th NDP (1980-84)
1) Rice production
2) Livestock production: goat farm, cattle breeding.
3) Uplands crop: maize, soya beans, cowpeas for animal feeds
4) Fisheries: fresh water fish
5) Forestry: timber production
6) Other minerals: Silica land in Tutong (with reserves of 20 million tons), sand mining and pottery/tile industry based on coastal terrace clay and ceramic clay
7) Agro industries: vegetable oil, castor oil, animal feed, leather works, oil-palm, fruit juice and puree factory, orchard growing for export, coconut oil extraction and fibre factory

5th NDP (1986-90)
1) Agriculture and livestock industry:
• Rice, Tropical Fruits, Vegetables, Cattle, buffalo and goat, Chicken and Eggs
2) Fisheries:
• Marine fish, Aquaculture: freshwater and brackish water, Fish meal
3) Forestry:
• Using swamp forest product for plywood, Fibre-board factory using woodchips from the sawmill factories
4) Manufacturing:
• Food processing: canning and packaging,
• Furniture
• Potteries and Tiles
• Textiles: high value added types of garments using modern and traditional technologies
• Cement factory to grind imported clinker
• Precast concrete factory
• Chemicals and dyes
• Plywood and Wood paneling
• Glass from silica sands in Tutong

5) Tertiary Industry: Banking and finance, Insurance, Maintenance services

6) Financial Centre
7) Trade Centre
8) High value-added, non-labour intensive industries
9) Bio industry

6th NDP (1991-1995)
1) Industry
• Industrial sites to be developed in 3 districts
• Identified industries are:
o Mini steel plant
o Light-weight aggregate
o Dairy milk
o Glass
o Pre-cast
2) Agriculture:
o Rice
o Hydrophonic vegetables
o Eggs and poultry
o Local fruits and production of seedlings
o Horticulture
o Buffaloes and goats

3) Forestry: Rattan plantation for furniture industry
4) Fisheries: Marine fish

7th NDP (1996-2000)
1) Oil sector:
• Plan to develop the oil and gas industry into downstream activities including:
i. Ammonia/Urea
ii. Methanol
iii. Export Oriented Refinery
iv. Other Petrochemical such as plastics and paints

2) Primary Sector:
• To produce 7% of rice requirements;
• To maintain the self-sufficiency level of egg production;
• To meet 70% of local chicken needs;
• Increase production of vegetables, plants and ornaments and livestocks;
• Aquaculture projects tp produce high values species for export

8th NDP (2001-2005)
1) Oil and gas sector:
• Oil and gas downstream activities

2) Industry
• Value-added industry such as food processing
• Export specialized services such as engineering, Islamic banking, law, economy, accounting, architecture and estate management.
• Manufacturing: Construction materials and equipment, garment and furniture.

3) Primary Sector
• Agriculture targets:
 3% of rice requirement
 To meet 94% of vegetable needs
 To meet 47% self-sufficiency in fruit production.
 Increase production of ornamentals horticulture industry.
• Livestock industry:
• Broiler industry to meet 100% self-sufficiency
• Poultry production to maintain 100% self sufficiency level.

• Fishery sector:
• Production of rostris prawn
• Production of other fish species such as mud crab, golden snapper and barramundi cod.

4) Tourism and Trade
• Develop more eco-tourism destinations.
• Promotion of cottage industry such as:
• Traditional food, Weaved cloths, Rattan furniture, Plaited products, Malay Cap, Sculptures and carving, Woodwork, Silverware, Brassware, Malay dagger, Boats
5) Banking, Finance and Insurance
• To become an international financial centre through BIFC

6) Other promoted sectors:
• ICT for k-ekonomy; Transhipment activities.

Personally, I believe there is nothing wrong for us to come up with ‘new ideas’ for new projects each year, but we need to supply our ‘ideas’ (especially the fancy ones) with some strategies and plan of execution I suppose. Otherwise, it will just be another list in the non-exhaustive yet-to-be-achieved projects.

I have done the basic dirty work of compiling this list. For anyone out there who is thinking of pursuing a Masters degree and/or a PhD, I hope this is of some use to you. (Panjang amal). This could be used as a basis of developing a research question, I think.

Salaam.