Public & private sectors need to intensify collaboration as nation restarts economy — Mustapa
20 May 2020
The public and private sectors need to intensify their strong collaboration in the new era of COVID-19 to support the economy as the country restart businesses, mainly through the support of digital transformation, Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department Datuk Seri Mustapa Mohamed said.
He said the PPP (public-private partnership), which has done well in the past and during this new normal, has to get things moving once again.
“We want to sustain the country’s economic growth. Therefore, we need to take the advantage of the growth opportunity presented by the global digital age to the fullest and to increase our productivity and enhance our competitiveness,” he said in his keynote address during a policy webinar themed “Rebuilding the Economy with Enabling Policies” today.
Mustapa said the transformation process is underway and the country has to continue its growth journey and making sure that growth is inclusive in order to capitalise on the growth record and push the country to the next growth development.
“We need to leverage, of course, on opportunity that the ICT can offer for all of us. Hence, the public and private sectors need to become more efficient and more dynamic,” he said.
He also stressed that industries need to continue to provide essential services to meet customers’ requests and the products should exceed the expectations of the customers and business community.
Mustapa said the government also wants to make sure that small and medium enterprises (SMEs), being the nation’s backbone, move in tandem with the current development in the global economy.
Therefore, better linkages between the SMEs and multinational enterprises need to be improved.
“In Malaysia and in other parts of the world, we have to think about how to restart the economy with the adoption of technology in our daily lives. This approach is being implemented aggressively by our government.
“We want a lot of our public sales and transactions to be made available online by 90 per cent, 95 per cent or even 100 per cent. As for intra government, the target is 70 per cent and this is going to be part of our strategy.
“In the current challenges that we’re facing, it has motivate us to move even faster from this journey of digital society or fully digital society,” he explained.
The one-hour panel session highlighted the importance of an enabling policy infrastructure to accelerate economic reboot, during which the speakers identified three to five core policies which are critical and require urgent attention in the wake of the new normal post COVID-19.
The possible issues anticipated are digital first policy with cloud, skilling and employability, and digital economy.
These issues are more important than ever as the world deals with and recovers from COVID-19, with requirements for distribution of funds and an effective management of resources.
Source: Bernama
