The Ministry of Modernisation of Agriculture, Native Land and Regional Development has already activated and rebuilt Agriculture Stations in the state in stages since the 10th Malaysia Plan (10MP) and is expected to be completed by 2020.
This was disclosed by Assistant Minister of Agriculture, Dr Abdul Rahman Ismail during a Question & Answer session at DUN sitting, yesterday.
Dr Rahman was replying to a question submitted by Krian Assemblyman, Ali Biju.
He added that the aim of the initiative was to facilitate and provide the best services to the rural population.
“Functions of the Agriculture Stations are to reach out to people in the interior areas where officers from the Agriculture Department will provide services to the local communities because of bad road links,” he said.
According to him, among the things that have been and are being implemented are upgrading and repairing six Agriculture Stations (which have been fully implemented); reconstructing 22 Agricultural Stations where 10 have started construction in the 10MP while 15 more will be built in the 11MP.
Building seven new Agricultural Stations; supply and improve logistics facilities; restructuring needs of employees and closing 12 Agricultural Stations which are no longer needed because of good road links.
In reply to Ali’s question regarding the total budget for reactivating the Agriculture Stations, Dr Abdul Rahman said that in order to upgrade and repair 15 Agriculture Stations, a total of RM960,000 is needed.
Meanwhile, to reconstruct 15 Agriculture Stations and to build seven new ones RM97.5 million and RM25 million are required, respectively.
