THE 2015 Budget that was tabled in Parliament last Friday by the prime minister was, for a large part, about quick wins, focusing on major sectors of the population and yet not sidelining the minorities.
Measures and initiatives that were announced centred around the lower income group — people earning RM4,000 and below, women and the Bumiputera, who each makes up 55 per cent, close to half and about two-thirds of the population, respectively.
The aim was to ensure that the Budget touches as many people as possible, even though, as the prime minister puts it, it may not be appreciated by the people on the ground.
But quick wins was not all there was. Although much attention zeroed in on addressing rising cost of living, the government realises that with 2020 only half a decade away, time is running out to do whatever it can to propel the country into the league of developed nations. Hence, a subtle but no less significant is the emphasis on youth, particularly in leveraging youth as the nation’s human capital.
Youth, or people aged between 15 and 40 by official definition, makes up around 42 per cent of the country’s population. A forward looking Budget must, therefore, ensure that this significant segment of the society is well-prepared for a challenging economic environment of the present and the future.
It is, therefore, commendable that there is a strategy specifically for youth. The sixth strategy, among others, allocates RM320 million to implement skills training, leadership, volunteering and entrepreneurship (including agropreneurship). It is also proposing the establishment of 1Malaysia Youth City that will combine work, live and play in a comprehensive, youth-friendly ecosystem.
In addition, the youth development agenda is embedded in all the other strategies. In the third Budget strategy, for instance, various initiatives to develop human capital and entrepreneurship are tailored for youth, comprising skills training and higher education. Billions of ringgits are allocated to a number of key ministries to expand the quantity and quality of skills training programmes available, to increase the capacity of skills training institutions to enable them to increase student intake, to sponsor higher education and to increase the number of people with postgraduate qualifications.
Private corporations are given double tax deduction on scholarships awarded to students and on expenses incurred to implement structured internship programmes in vocational and technical courses.
Also worth highlighting in the third strategy is the allocation of RM30 million to provide technical training and education assistance specifically to Indian youth.
There are more initiatives for the youth within other strategies, too. For example, good news for young Indian and young professional women entrepreneurs as RM50 million are allocated each to the Indian Entrepreneurs Financing Scheme and the Young Professional Women Entrepreneurs Development Programme.
Simply put, there are no shortage of plans and programmes when it comes to human capital development.
The question is, will the private sector respond favourably when it’s time to get down to business? SMEs, in particular, have all these while been dragging their feet. So much so that the government is running out of ideas and energy to get the needle moving.
The government has expressed its commitment to review the curriculum and programmes at public skills training institutions and institutions of higher learning.
In addition, Talentcorp will provide RM30 million for an Industry-Academia Programme that seeks to bring together universities, the government and the private sector in developing the curriculum for the internship programmes and industrial training. The government will also implement various programmes to encourage the growth of key industries which would, hopefully, absorb the graduates that will be churned out from our universities and skills training institutes.
But all these are government driven initiatives and will remain as such so long as corporations and businesses cannot see their participation yielding a positive net present value.
Notwithstanding all the measures above, efforts to foster academia-industry linkages are nothing new. A lot have been done at the national as well as at the institutions’ level, with arguably little success. The policymakers must now find new ways to incite private sector interest in participating in industry-linked programmes in the academia.
This would be beyond the scope of the Budget, nonetheless, is imperative to address in the coming year.