{"id":10227,"date":"2021-07-07T19:12:50","date_gmt":"2021-07-07T11:12:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/?p=10227"},"modified":"2021-07-07T19:12:51","modified_gmt":"2021-07-07T11:12:51","slug":"felda-has-potential-to-become-worlds-top-plantation-group-again","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/?p=10227","title":{"rendered":"FELDA has potential to become world’s top plantation group again"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

KUALA LUMPUR, July 7\u00a0— Prime Minister Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin today expressed hope that\u00a0the Federal Land Development Authority (FELDA) would be ranked among the most successful global plantation corporations in the future such as those on the\u00a0Fortune Global 500 list.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Armed with a land bank totaling\u00a0832,000 hectares or more than two\u00a0million acres, FELDA has the capability and huge\u00a0potential to become the world\u2019s top plantation group once more, he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI realise that this is not easy to achieve. However, with its three-pronged strategy (Restart, Revitalise and Reform) and the new management\u2019s commitment as well as government support, it is not impossible to do,\u201d the prime minister said in his pre-recorded speech for the virtual launch of the 2021 FELDA Settlers Day today.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Muhyiddin said one issue that could hamper FELDA\u2019s efforts to rise again to be on a par with the world\u2019s renowned plantation companies is the debt issue, which must be resolved to facilitate the process to \u201crestart\u201d FELDA.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Therefore, he said, the government has agreed to partially write off\u00a0settlers\u2019 loans totalling RM8.3 billion through a conditional settlers\u2019 loan adjustment initiative especially for the earlier-generation settlers.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"plantation\"<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

He said this conditional write-off involves, among others, a partial\u00a0adjustment of the\u00a0replanting loan balance\u00a0up to Dec 31, 2019, amounting to\u00a0RM8 billion which will benefit\u00a092,441 settlers or\u00a082 percent of the 112,638 settlers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

To revitalise FELDA so it would return to a strong footing, Muhyiddin said, the government has also approved the issuance of government-guaranteed sukuk valued at RM9.9 billion to strengthen FELDA\u2019s business model.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

According to him, part of the sukuk issuance is used to restructure loans with financial institutions as well as for the takeover of FGV Holdings Bhd.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The prime minister also expressed confidence that the loan restructuring would allow FELDA to refocus efforts on strengthening its core business.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe Cabinet\u2019s approval of the proposal by the Special Task Force (on FELDA\u2019s rehabilitation) previously will also enable FELDA to increase its shareholding in FGV up to 81.3 per cent.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI am given to understand that this development would create a plantation synergy that could boost productivity and hence the FELDA group\u2019s profits,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In addition, he said, the expansion of FELDA\u2019s participation in downstream industries that have a higher profit margin would enable FELDA to achieve its target to return to profitability by 2023.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He noted that FELDA has started to implement smart agriculture to manage 458,000 hectares of its and settlers\u2019 farming land nationwide by using the precision agriculture concept, in line with the national agenda towards the Fourth Industrial Revolution.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

With the cooperation of the FELDA community, Muhyiddin said, the system can enhance plantation operations through the monitoring and collection of more detailed information as well as savings on operating costs of more than RM200 million within five years.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

— BERNAMA<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

KUALA LUMPUR, July 7\u00a0— Prime Minister Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin today expressed hope that\u00a0the Federal…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":10228,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[524],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10227","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-nation"],"featured_image_urls":{"full":["https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/Screen-Shot-2021-07-07-at-19.09.32.png",588,368,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/Screen-Shot-2021-07-07-at-19.09.32-150x150.png",150,150,true],"medium":["https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/Screen-Shot-2021-07-07-at-19.09.32-300x188.png",300,188,true],"medium_large":["https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/Screen-Shot-2021-07-07-at-19.09.32.png",588,368,false],"large":["https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/Screen-Shot-2021-07-07-at-19.09.32.png",588,368,false],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/Screen-Shot-2021-07-07-at-19.09.32.png",588,368,false],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/Screen-Shot-2021-07-07-at-19.09.32.png",588,368,false],"newsium-slider-full":["https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/Screen-Shot-2021-07-07-at-19.09.32.png",588,368,false],"newsium-featured":["https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/Screen-Shot-2021-07-07-at-19.09.32.png",588,368,false],"newsium-medium":["https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/Screen-Shot-2021-07-07-at-19.09.32.png",588,368,false]},"author_info":{"info":["Editor"]},"category_info":"Nation<\/a>","tag_info":"Nation","comment_count":"0","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10227","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=10227"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10227\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10229,"href":"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10227\/revisions\/10229"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/10228"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=10227"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=10227"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=10227"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}