Malaysia gained new economic growth with RM306.5 billion worth of approved investments in the manufacturing, services and primary sectors in 2021.
The country remained an attractive investment destination for global and regional business expansion as total Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) and Domestic Direct Investment (DDI) numbers exceeded expectations with stellar performance in 2021,
increasing to 83.1 per cent from the achievement attained 2020.
The Senior Minister iterated that the recent FDI’s stellar performance accounted for nearly 68.1 per cent of approved investments, valued at RM208.6 billion compared to RM64.2 billion in 2020 which is an increase of 224.9 per cent, while DDI totalled RM97.9 billion.
The DDI complemented FDI performance, making up 31.9 per cent of the total investment value. The manufacturing sector led the way for total investments approved in 2021, recording RM195.1 billion, followed by the services sector RM94.1 billion and the primary sector with RM17.3 billion.
Penang (RM83.5 billion) recorded the highest investments approved last year, followed by Kedah (RM68.3 billion), Kuala Lumpur (RM37.7 billion), Selangor (RM28.8 billion) and Sarawak (RM25.7 billion). These five states contributed 79.6 per cent of the total approved investments for 2021.
While the Netherlands (RM78 billion), Singapore (RM47.3 billion), People’s Republic of China (PRC) (RM31.3 billion), Austria (RM18.9 billion) and Japan (RM9.9 billion) accounted for 88.9 per cent of total FDI approved in the manufacturing, services and primary sectors.
Malaysia’s manufacturing sector secured projects worth RM195.1 billion for 2021 compared to the RM91.3 billion it gained in 2020 – a major increase of 113.7 per cent. These achievements will offer 74,575 job opportunities, whereby 28,698 are managerial, technical, supervisory and skilled (MTS) positions.
The electrical and electronics (E&E) industry received the most investment opportunities, with 94 approved projects worth RM148 billion. Besides the E&E industry, Malaysia attracted high levels of approved investments in other industries, including basic metal products (RM19.4 billion), chemicals and chemical products (RM5.8 billion), rubber products (RM5.8 billion) and food manufacturing (RM5.4 billion).
Malaysia has secured 75 capital intensive projects valued at RM100 million and above and these projects will spur the growth of new advanced manufacturing technologies and produce a highly-skilled workforce.
The manufacturing sector continued to be the mainstay of the economy for 2021 generating significant multiplier effects on the nation’s activities and growth. The percentage of quality projects approved increased to 81.3 per cent in 2021. As reflected by the MTS (Managerial,
Technical, Supervisory and Skilled) Index, the number of job opportunities in these positions increased to 38.5 per cent in 2021.
In 2021, Malaysia secured 3,803 projects in the services sector worth RM94.1 billion in approved investments. The DDI brought RM69.2 billion in 2021 compared to RM63.5 billionin 2020 in this sector, underscoring the inherent strength of Malaysia’s companies that could
be leveraged further for export of services.
The top five contributors of approved investments in this sector were real estate (RM28.8 billion), global establishments (RM19.7 billion), financial services (RM12.0 billion), utilities (RM9.6 billion) and information and communications (RM8.2 billion), experiencing 36.6 per
cent in growth, valued at RM78.3 billion of approved investments compared to 2020.
The global establishments sub-sector recorded RM19.7 billion in 2021, higher than RM595.2 million achieved in 2020. A total of 102 principal hubs, regional and representative offices were approved in 2021 and expected to offer 3,838 new positions for highly-technical
professionals.
The primary sector registered approved investments of RM17.3 billion in 2021, compared to RM6.1 billion in 2020. The mining sub-sector led the bulk of investments RM17.1 billion (98.7%) of total investments approved in the primary sector driven by higher prices for crude oil and natural gas. The rest of the primary sector investments comprises the plantation and commodities and the agriculture subsectors with investment values of RM211.4 million and RM20.5 million, respectively.
