Validations show Malaysia can weather uncertainties - Abdul Rahman

Minister in the Prime Minister's Department, Datuk Abdul Rahman Dahlan, said independent bodies, including the World Bank and International Monetary Fund and institutions like OCBC, RHB and CIMB, had also validated it in their respective independent reports.

Also, he said, the Grant Thornton International Business Report (IBR) released yesterday said that Malaysia has the most proportion of businesses in ASEAN that was expecting to offer employees a pay rise in next 12 months.

The IBR report said employee salaries and other key economic indicators, including revenue, exports, selling prices, employment and also profits were expected to improve despite the low optimism outlook for the year ahead.

He said Malaysia was good at employee pay rise, increase in export, revenue, higher selling prices, better profitability and more hiring compared to other businesses in Asean countries.

"It is a good report for Malaysia in 2017 and hopefully we will be able to weather out the uncertainties," he said.

The minister said the people were now eager to see whether the economic policy of US president-elect Donald Trump would have a significant impact on Malaysia.

Abdul Rahman earlier witnessed the exchange of investment agreements and memorandums of understanding between A-Bio Sdn Bhd, an investment arm of Malaysian Industry-Government Group for High Technology, with eight local firms.

A-Bio Managing Director, Dr Norida Abd Rahman, said with the exchange of a slew of agreements, A-Bio was on track to invest up to RM100 million in selected Malaysian high-growth technology companies involved in the bio industry and emerging technology industry.

"A Bio's fist round of investment until 2013 worth RM50 million was in early stage start-up companies in bio-based industry and for this second round of investment commencing 2016, we invest in high-growth stage companies with planned expansion into global market," she said.

Among the companies involved are Extra-Built (M) Sdn Bhd (Malaysian light-emitting diode lighting company); Detik Aturan Sdn Bhd (pioneer in oil palm pellet and briquattes production); Prestigous Discovery Sdn Bhd (a leading company for remote terminal unit); and, Dream Edge Sdn Bhd (design house and engineering solutions company).