BY GABRIEL LIHAN AND NUR ATIQAH QURATULAINI
KUCHING: The Centre for Technology Excellence Sarawak (CENTEXS) looks into the future as rice remains the main source of food consumption among Malaysians and countries worldwide.
CENTEXS chief executive officer (CEO) Datuk Syeed Mohd Hussein Wan Abd Rahman’s remarks were futuristic as he pointed out the importance of ensuring food security for future population for Malaysians, especially Sarawakians.
“We started our test bed programme in December 2023, this is important because we use different technology for paddy.
“This is a very important subject matter because our food, everyone eats rice everyday, i mean imagine one day no rice, no porridge, nasi goreng, it would be difficult, everyone would not be able to stand the situation as rice is something we eat everyday, we can’t skip it (rice),” he said during his address at CENTEXS Paddy Testbed programme at CENTEXS Santubong on Thursday (April 4).
Syeed added that cultivating paddy cannot be avoided as rice continues to be an in-demand commodity globally.
He noted the potential uncertainty of the rice industry in the future remains despite 70 per cent of rice imported is mainly from Vietnam and India.
“This would be a very dangerous situation for us in Malaysia, especially in Sarawak, it affects all of us,” he added, pointing out the potential concerns if countries refuse to export their rice to Malaysia in the future.
Meanwhile, speaking on CENTEXS’ paddy cultivation testbed using drip irrigation, Syeed said for the particular test bed which uses green energy, solar, windmill powering up the process which is required by the test bed.
“We have made a lot of studies on this and we thought this is the best, in order to become a net exporter of (rice) in Malaysia,” he added.
CENTEXS on Thursday had its first harvesting activity using a machinery known as Combined Harvester, the machine provided by the Department of Agriculture (DOA).
In addition, CENTEXS found the paddy cultivation through a drip irrigation system in Turkey, Italy and India to help reduce the planting cost which may increase paddy production by up to 20 to 40 per cent compared to the traditional method.
This innovative technique significantly reduces water usage by 70 per cent and is anticipated to yield 10 tons per hectare per season, representing a 30 per cent increased compared to the traditional flood irrigation method.
