Dashboard system being developed to assess long-term benefits of business events in S’wak

KUCHING (Aug 30): Sarawak is developing a state-of-the-art dashboard system designed to enable business event planners to assess their impact and provide a comprehensive overview of their contributions to the state.

Minister of Tourism, Creative Industry and Performing Arts Dato Sri Abdul Karim Rahman Hamzah said the dashboard, designed to monitor, validate, report and capture the long-term benefits of business events held in Sarawak, is the first of its kind in Malaysia.

“The dashboard allows business event planners to track their impact and provide a holistic picture of their contributions to Sarawak.

“We plan to launch the legacy impact dashboard by the first quarter of 2025,” he told a press conference held at Baitulmakmur Building II in Petra Jaya here today.

Abdul Karim said that the dashboard is being developed by Universiti Malaysia Sarawak (Unimas) in collaboration with Business Events Sarawak as part of two studies on the economic and legacy impacts of business events in the state.

A memorandum of agreement on the collaboration was exchanged during the press conference.

The first study focuses on economic impact, under the guidance of Prof Dr Rossazana, dean of the Faculty of Economic and Business at Unimas.

This study will develop a detailed economic framework to record and report data on business event visitor arrivals and revenue generation.

It will employ new Sarawak-level economic measurements based on the six key sectors outlined in the Post Covid-19 Development Strategy (PCDS) 2030: manufacturing, agriculture, tourism, forestry, mining and services.

“This aligns with the government’s aspiration for business events and tourism to increase visitor arrivals by 7.5 per cent per annum and contribute 11 per cent to Sarawak’s GDP by 2030. Presently, the contribution of tourism to the GDP is only about seven per cent and we plan to push it up to 11 per cent,” he said.

The second study examines the legacy impact of conferences and exhibitions, focusing on their broader effects such as community development, social responsibility, policy influence and investment opportunities.

“We have selected events from 2022 onward according to their alignment with the PCDS’ key areas of interest and general community interests,” said Abdul Karim.

He noted that last year, the Premier announced his intention to establish Sarawak as the legacy capital of business events in Malaysia as well as in Borneo.

“Achieving this requires ensuring that everything that we do relates to the Legacy Impact Master Action Plan which we are doing from 2023 until 2025.

“We are in the second year of the action plan and this stage is about measuring and verifying the events’ legacies. With the research and findings from Unimas, we are going to improve our legacy measurements and be ready for the reporting as well as communicating phase through the dashboard next year,” he added.

Present were Ministry of Tourism, Creative Industry and Performing Arts deputy minister Datuk Sebastian Ting and deputy permanent secretary Desmond Douglas Jerukan; Business Events Sarawak chairman Dato Sri Abang Abdul Karim Tun Datuk Abang Openg and CEO Amelia Roziman; and Unimas vice chancellor Prof Dr Ahmad Hata Rasit and senior director of its research, innovation and enterprise centre Prof Dr Lo May Chiun.