THE Thirteenth Malaysia Five Year Plan, covering 2025 to 2030, is a critical document for Malaysia in its determination to achieve its developed country status with per capita income of about USD15 thousand dollars. The target has been set many years ago when the nation was implementing its Vision 2020 plan.
The Prime Minister when launching the new Plan put the emphasis of reforming the public service as a key element in achieving the macroeconomic and developmental targets of the nation.
These efforts certainly do not begin with efforts from `ground zero’ as Malaysia has had decades of experience in economic and social development and with proven institutions, many of which are still functioning.
Value creation appears to be the rallying call of the new Plan and this has to be understood by the large number of public servants at all levels and in every dimension of the public sector.
Certainly, institutions such as the Public Service Department and its training wing INTAN will have to examine the phrase value creation and what it means to all departments and the staffs.
It is the sum total of value addition that make up the additions to the total stocks of goods and services produced in the previous quarter or year. That is economic growth in simple terms.
In equally simple terms the public servants will have to ensure that his or her work contributes in some measure to the additions of new goods and services in the economy over and above the costs of their upkeep, that is their salaries and allowances.
In amplifying these matters in relation to their day-to-day work, government servants must think in terms of efficiency, effectiveness and impact or outcome of their decisions and activities. Doing things that are less efficient, less effective and less impactful means negative or minimal contribution to total output of goods and services of the public sector economy.
May be the civil servants have to examine their basics again in terms of their policy and project planning and their budgeting system.
In relation to their budgeting system, the concern for input, output and outcome must remain the central concern, and the impact or outcome concern must be as maximum as possible so that cost benefit ratio or the ROI is the highest.
Doing the same way yearly will not take us far. This is where innovations and creativity are important and that an innovative culture must be internalized and appreciated by everyone and encouraged in all organizations.
In this regard INTAN, the premier training institution for the civil service, in particular, has much to reflect on the two basic words `value creation’ and what they imply to all public servants at all levels.
The second concern in value addition or value creation is the policy formulation and project planning as well as implementation. The Government spends billions of Ringgit yearly so as to improve the quality of life of the rakyat and to strengthen the economic base for enhanced production of goods and services.
Public expenditures have multiplier effects and spillover effects on the economy especially in the regions where they are spent or located. Thus, these must be estimated and maximized so as to bring about the most benefits to the community.
Malaysia is not poor in its data collection, certainly not in their quality. Data are now available at the district level now which can used in project planning and estimation of its benefits.
Thanks to Dato Seri Dr. Uzir, the Chief Statistician for doing so much improvement to the department to its present strength of making data availability at the district level which is good for local level policy and project planning.
Additionally, the Department of Statistics Malaysia (DOSM) has good Input-Output statistics for decades since early 1970s, giving a good understanding of interindustry economics, such as multipliers and industry linkages (forward and backward linkages), now, for 124 sub-sectors.
There is just no excuse for projects to be badly planned because of dearth of data. Our project planners must do lots of homework to use the available data to assess project input, output and impacts thus ensuring public expenditures contribute significantly to `value creation’ as expected by the Prime Minister, needless to say.
But alas, development planning and project formulation which are dynamic subjects are now less emphasized in skill training. This is not healthy. In this season of fiscal constraints and many observations of project delays and failures, the need for such training is more than necessary.
The message is clear. We need to strengthen development planning and project formulation expertise, among our civil servants, including the senior ones, to ensure that the latter can guide the implementation of the Thirteenth Malaysia Plan projects, towards their fruitful conclusion. – August 5, 2025
Tan Sri Dr. Sulaiman Mahbob is an Adjunct Professor at the International Institute of Public Policy and Management (INPUMA), Universiti Malaya