Kata Alu-aluan

	Welcome to Institute of Plantation Studies website! This year is a challenging year for the agriculture sector in Malaysia. While still reeling to recover from the effects of COVID-19 pandemic, global and domestic agriculture is now facing a new shock from the Russia-Ukraine war. This war, which may perpetuate longer than what was initially anticipated, has resulted in global supply shortages of major agricultural commodities that are mainly produced by the two countries, ranging from wheat, maize to fertilizers. The global supply shocks have resulted in steep increase in prices of these commodities causing significant food inflation all around the world.   The effects of the current development on Malaysian agriculture are twofold. Prices of food commodities, just like in other countries, have gone up and the government is actively instituting various measures to mitigate food inflation. On the other hand, the commodities sector, particularly palm oil is set to benefit from windfall profits from record high prices and weakening Malaysian ringgit. However, the benefits are not fully capitalized. On the plantation side, the oil palm industry is still very much labor dependent and is facing issues of labor shortages, hampering harvesting efficiency. The industry also utilizes tremendous amount of fertilizer, which is not only environmentally unsustainable but also costly at times of escalating fertilizer prices.   There is much work and research that need to be conducted to improve production efficiency of the palm oil industry. In fact, there are also rooms for efficiency improvements in other industrial and food crops in this country. The Institute of Plantation Studies is actively conducting research at different levels of agriculture activities that include plant agronomy, pest and disease management, mechanization and automation, smart agriculture, IOT, and biomass utilization to improve the productivity and efficiency of this sector. Apart from research, the institute also recognizes the importance of knowledge dissemination and transfer. Series of short courses on soil identification and classification are being offered to planters and researchers to help improve the knowledge on optimal soil management. The institute also offers training on drone application in agriculture, which covers basic flight programming, mapping and data management.   We strongly believe in the importance of knowledge sharing, and this website serves as a platform to update our stakeholders on the current development and activities of our institute.	Profesor Dr. Shaufique Fahmi Ahmad Sidique Director, Institute of Plantation Studies Jan, 2022.

Kemaskini:: 04/11/2022 [ainzubaidah]