KUCHING: The need for the development and upgrading of farm roads in Sarawak continues to rise, with 841 projects involving a total distance of 3,428 kilometres and an estimated cost of RM347 million still awaiting approval.

Sarawak Minister for Food Industry, Commodity and Regional Development Dato Sri Dr Stephen Rundi Utom revealed the number of applications received currently far exceeds the approved projects, and his ministry expects more applications to be received from time to time.

“However, this is still far below the total demand received by my ministry, involving 841 farm road projects covering 3,428 kilometres with an estimated project cost of RM347 million, and we expect more applications to be received after this,” he said.

He said this during his ministerial winding-up session at the 19th Sarawak Legislative Assembly (DUN) Sitting on Tuesday.

According to him, the high demand for farm road construction proves that such infrastructure remains a priority for rural agricultural communities in strengthening the connectivity network between production areas and markets.

He added that better farm road facilities not only help reduce transportation costs and post-harvest losses, but also ease the movement of the farming community and improve access to production areas.

In the same development, he informed that a total of RM103.3 million has been approved by the Sarawak and Federal governments to implement over 300 farm road projects spanning over 1,900 kilometres throughout 2026.

According to him, the implementation of these projects is expected to benefit more than 18,000 farmers across Sarawak, besides stimulating rural economic growth and attracting more investments into the agriculture and agro-food sectors. -UKASnews

Prepared By: Gabriel Rommy
Photos By: Ibanez Jeffery
Translator: Ryan Lim