KUALA LUMPUR: The Malaysian Investment Development Authority (MIDA) is on track to achieve its targeted RM200 billion in approved investment for 2018 on the back of encouraging numbers recorded to date.
MIDA chief executive officer Datuk Azman Mahmud said from January to August, approved foreign direct investment alone stood at RM43.77 billion, an encouraging growth as compared to RM16 billion recorded during the same period a year ago.
“I think we are on track to meet the (RM200 billion) approved investment target for this year.
"The trend is encouraging if we compare to last year's numbers,” he told reporters on the sidelines of the National Investment Seminar 2018 here today.
Yesterday, MIDA announced that new approved direct investments currently stood at RM80.2 billion from January to June this year.
Azman said there are a lot of incentives that are likely to be announced in the upcoming Budget 2019 for the industry, which expected to contribute 41 per cent to the country’s gross domestic product (GDP) by 2020.
“We leave it to the Prime Minister Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad and Finance Minsiter Lim Guan Eng to lay out to the people what are the incentives as well as budget plans that we have for 2019,” he told reporters after launching the National Investment Seminar 2018 organised by MIDA.
Also present is International Trade and Industry minister Datuk Darell Leiking.Meanwhile, Darell said small and medium enterprises (SMEs) can expect some good news during the coming Budget 2019 which to be tabled on November 2.
MIDA has also launched its i-Services Portal, a business linkage platform to connect service providers and their potential clients, during the event.
Darell said SMEs can expect access to financing mechanism will be reshaped with the development of more non-traditional financing avenues and platforms such as crowdfunding, peer-to-peer financing and venture capital.
“Building on the achievements of the existing SME Masterplan, there will be new policies, directions, strategies, action plans and programmes to uplift our SMEs to be at par with those in developed countries.
“We aim to equip SMEs with the necessary technology and knowledge in line with megatrends, particularly in the advent of the Fourth Industrial Revolution,” he said.