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KUALA LUMPUR — The Malaysian government will delay nonessential public projects and use the money instead to build up food stockpiles amid a global food crisis, the prime minister said Saturday.
If measures are not taken now "it will be difficult later," Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi was quoted as saying by national news agency Bernama.
He said a $1.3 billion plan announced recently to guarantee food supplies can be funded adequately only if money is diverted from non-urgent public projects.
"We cannot wait for it (shortages) to happen first. Then there will be chaos," Abdullah said. "As such, the government has restructured the allocations for less urgent projects which can be delayed."
Widespread discontentment among Malaysians will occur if the government does not make plans to guarantee a supply of food with prices steadily rising over the last year, Abdullah said.
"The government has also decided to create a buffer stock not only for rice but also other essential goods needed by the people regardless of whether they are poor, rich, from the urban or rural areas," he said.
He said the reluctance of some countries to export rice to Malaysia was causing problems.
Malaysia grows 65 percent to 70 percent of the rice its people consume, while the rest is imported, mainly from Thailand. With the price of Thai rice nearly tripling in the last five months, the government expects consumers to switch to local rice.
But the government says it is planning to subsidize locally grown rice to keep its price steady.
The surge in rice prices has come amid poor weather in some rice-producing nations and demand that has outstripped supply. Some Asian countries, including India and Vietnam, have contributed to the problem by curbing rice exports to guarantee their own supplies.
Malaysia also announced plans recently to boost domestic food security by growing rice on a massive scale in a state on Borneo island.
Abdullah also urged land owners to use it for agriculture. "The land must be utilized. Neglected (rice) paddy land should be planted with fruit trees, vegetables," he said.
