ROUND TABLE: SESSION 2

Mr. Piotr Stryzowski, Dato' Dr. Mahani Zainal Abidin and Professor Gunter Koch

Session 2, “What are the major challenges for Malaysia in making the transition?” started with Professor Pirjo Stahle who explained the Finland experience in early 1990s where the GNP contracted sharply and the economy crumbled. From this crisis, Finland built up their economy by identifying the electronics industry as a key driver to growth. She explained that pillars and drivers are different across different economies (developing, transitional and developed). Another key point is that drivers cannot function in the long run without the bases created by pillars.

For Finland, education is the most important pillar. In Finland, the concept is for equal options and free education for everyone. Pedagogics was also renewed from the 1990s, putting thinking skills and problem based learning at the forefront of childhood education. The child is also regarded and treated as decision maker and evaluator.

Presenting the case of Malaysia in terms of tertiary education, Malaysia had an upswing until mid-2000, then reached a plateau, whereas Singapore is still experiencing a continuous upswing.

A country needs to find sources of renewal to push its level of achievement to the next level.

Professor Mahindran Nair and Emeritus Professor Dato' Dr Osman Bakar

Professor Danny Quah in “batting for the Malaysian team” had to qualify that he had been in the UK since Britain itself pushed for innovation and a transformation of its own economy from industrialisation to information, from “metal bashers” and manipulating molecules to manipulating digital bits and bytes.

Lessons to be learnt:

• “The Law of Unintended Consequences” comes into play (eg: Microsoft, Facebook began as a way for male Harvard undergrads to meet females).
• New technologies come about when designed to solve problems. In the Malaysian context, we need to be concrete and clear on what is the problem that we need to solve. China became a giant when it moved its factors of production from low value production to high value production. If we compare China to Finland, Sweden, Israel, we find that China is the only country that has experienced doube digit growth despite its government system and huge population.

Facts for Malaysia:

• Private investment is still 1/3 of what it used to be before 1997
• 25% of local graduates are unemployed
• 4/5ths of Malaysian workforce only have SPM qualification

Malaysia needs to discover how best to deploy the resources it has. For Professor Danny Quah, it is not ICT that is the next frontier for economic growth but climate change and renewable energy. ICT will play a supporting role but abundant opportunities for middle-income countries like Malaysia is in more down to earth frugal innovation useful to many more people around the world.

Professor Leif Edvinsson agreed with the practical insights provided by Professor Danny Quah. Prof Edvinsson highlighted that even Sweden is turning to China for some innovations in climate change and renewable energy. Professor Leif then asked all participants to write what they thought was the most powerful, energising question for the future of Malaysia. Some questions that arose:

“How important is national identity via 1Malaysia to the future of Malaysia?” (Professor Edvinsson: it’s still important to retain heterogeneity)

“How can the creative energy and capacity of Malaysian people best be nurtured, supported and exploited?” (Professor Leif recommends that Malaysia sets up a Ministry for the Future)

“Everyone is afraid to share knowledge, especially politicians,” Professor Leif pointed out. He then stressed the importance to create an environment that reduces this fear and encourages knowledge-sharing.

A study also found that fear of the future is greatest at the age of 40. Those with the highest propensity to change are the young and the CEOs, so an environment that connects these two populations together may be necessary.

Mr. Gerardo Rath Fingerl

During discussions, Mr. Sumita brought up the issue of development speed and its impact on human rights issues as well as societal breakdown (violence, suicides). Professor Quah pointed out that in relation to the whole population, the percentage of these breakdowns is pretty small, especially in China currently. He stressed that the most important human rights in the world is the removal of poverty.

Dr. Jomo KS posed the issue of Malaysia’s public spending, where Malaysia’s public spending on health and education has brought about different results.In public health, results have been positive but in education despite Malaysia’s high spending (one of the highest in the world in terms of percentage), the results have been mediocre. Why?