| James Kon and Fizah HAB |
FOLLOWING fruitful visits to numerous agriculture and aquaculture sites in Brunei Darussalam for the past two days, Singapore’s Minister of State, Ministry of Trade and Industry, Ministry of Development Dr Koh Poh Koon described that Brunei and Singapore has a ‘good natural fit’ to cooperate and come together to work on beneficial ways towards Brunei’s effort in diversifying its economy and at the same time increase Singapore’s food resilience.
Singapore’s Minister of State, Ministry of Trade and Industry, Ministry of Development who capped off his visits at the Searay Aquatech Sdn Bhd’s nursery located in the Serasa area in an interview said, “Brunei has a larger land mass and sea space so this is where Brunei has very rich natural resources and very favourable conditions for agriculture and aquaculture. Singapore with its smaller land mass and sea space would find a natural fit to look into investment opportunities in Brunei which also fits in with Brunei’s diversification of economy leveraging in with the lucrative agriculture sector.”
Building on the strong foundation of the bilateral ties of both countries, he said “during my two-day visit in Brunei, it is very clear that from the people-to-people level and government-to-government level, we have very close relations.”
He cited that some of the industry players from Singapore who are in Brunei for the first time on the trip can feel a sense of warmth and hospitality as well as officials from Brunei were very helpful in providing information and answering any inquiries giving a sense of confidence in looking at investment opportunities in Brunei.
“We hope that this kind of networking and opportunity seeking will continue beyond this trip to further build on the strengths that we have over the last few decades,” the minister added.
On the response from the Singaporean delegates, he said, “They are very excited and see that there are opportunities available in Brunei which were not available in Singapore. I felt that many good conversations have taken place and I hope that they will make more visits to Brunei to explore new partnerships as well as understand the environment here.”
Singapore’s Minister of State, Ministry of Trade and Industry, Ministry of Development Dr Koh Poh Koon taking a closer look at the fish nursery at Searay Aquatech. – JAMES KON
The Singaporean Minister of State, Ministry of Trade and Industry, Ministry of Development Dr Koh Poh Koon’s yesterday first visited one of the aquaculture farms situated at the Tanjung Pelumpong Aquaculture site in Muara as part of studying possible investment opportunities between Brunei Darussalam and Singapore.
Accompanying the minister and the Singaporean delegates were the Singapore High Commissioner to Brunei Darussalam Lim Hong Huai and the Permanent Secretary at the Ministry of Primary Resources and Tourism Dr Haji Abdul Manaf bin Haji Metussin.
The owner of the farm, Awang Haji Azahari bin Haji Chuchu explained the production capabilities of the farm before guiding the visitors to the floating fish farm. The local aquaculture farm, ODE Aquaculture and Agriculture, produced hybrid groupers, mouse grouper, seabass amongst others and produced up to 265 mt/year for both local and foreign market.
The visit to the Tanjung Pelumpong Aquaculture site was followed by a visit to Searay Aquatech Sdn Bhd’s fish nursery. On hand to welcome the Singapore delegation was Jeannie Loh, Managing Director of Searay Aquatech.
Searay Aquatech has 78 units of marine cages at Tanjung Pelumpong Marine Fish Cage site and the species culture include Seabass, Grouper, Pompano and Trevally. Currently the fishes are exported to China and Hong Kong.
Last year, there were about 12 tonnes of Seabass and one tonne of Groupers exported overseas.
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