Govt must reform to ensure economic recovery, say economists

 

Khazanah Research Institute’s Jomo Kwame Sundaram says the country must forge a new path as the country exits the pandemic period.

PETALING JAYA: Economists say there cannot be economic recovery without policy reform, adding that there needs to be operational changes if the country is to bounce back from the shocks felt from the Covid-19 pandemic.

They called for greater emphasis to be placed on forging a new path as the country exits the pandemic period, instead of returning to the state Malaysia was in pre-pandemic.

Speaking at a webinar as part of the “Future Malaysia Discourse Series”, Khazanah Research Instutute’s Jomo Kwame Sundaram said the country must “build forward rather than build back”.

“The government must acknowledge that the status quo was not wonderful, and that we have had an economy in the doldrums since the financial crisis in 2008.

 Geoffrey Williams.

“The possibility of reform is what I think we should be focusing on, because to go back to the past is just not good enough for us,” he said.

Geoffrey Williams of the Malaysia University of Science and Technology (MUST) said one important reform is a reduction in government involvement in the nation’s operations, as too much central planning stifles competition and growth.

“We need a different approach to the government and politics in the economy, and at the root of social market economy is competitiveness that should be encouraged.

“This means less government, we just need to look at the massive number of GLCs and the involvement of the GLCs in all manner of business, and we know that it is crushing competitiveness,” Williams said.

His sentiments were echoed by Noor Azlan Ghazali of Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia (UKM), who said that less government involvement would also benefit other areas.

UKM’s Noor Azlan Ghazali.

“Why can’t we get communities to choose the headmasters for schools, why should we be relying on Putrajaya to decide who is the headmaster for an area they might know little about.

“In Bangi, we have a very high rate of PhD per capita, could we not manage our local education system?”

Noor Azlan also used the environment as an example, and said that deploying NGOs to perform clean-up or restoration work would likely be more effective than government agencies as they would bring passion and expertise to the job.

This would also save the government money as departments would not have to perform certain tasks. - FMT