Framework for economic performance of rural areas in Malaysia: a territorial approach

Rural, poor and marginalized community often face many challenges in achieving economic equality and attaining socio-economic sustainability, especially among rural communities who have limited sources of income. Although it involves complex issues, it cannot be disregarded. Rural areas and its communities are important aspects of a country’s political and economic stability. In countries with emerging and developing economies such as Malaysia, rural populations constitute the majority of citizens. They are generally poorer and more disadvantaged than their urban counterparts. The study determines the factors for the differences in economic performance of the rural areas in Malaysia. The study also provides the framework to revitalize rural areas and the methods to use this framework that measure rural economic performance. Several methods were used to collect the information from rural communities using in-depth interview and structured survey. These two methods are important for this research in order to understand how the rural areas and its communities faced situation of growth or decline. By using this framework, the analysis of differentiation of economic performance provides understanding on how variation of factor influencing economic performance in rural areas and direct measures should be implemented in solving issues of rural decline

A framework for incorporating the global environment of rural community

The major problem with economic capital in rural communities around the world is income. There are many challenges for rural communities to developing their socioeconomic sustainability with their limited recourse. The rural community in Malaysia is also facing problems as a result of the disparity in development between urban and rural regions, particularly in terms of public amenities, infrastructure, utilities, and economic opportunities. In addition, rural communities are also often marginalized due to global issues of insecurity as well as the various challenges they often face in improving the economy of rural areas. Rural communities also often face socioeconomic problems, such as marginalized households and having different socioeconomic backgrounds. The purpose of this paper is to determine the factors incorporating economic capital in assessing rural community resilience in term of socioeconomic background. Next this paper also discusses the method that will be implement in this study but the data collection not being conducted yet. This paper also provides a framework incorporating the factors of economic capital and variables of socioeconomic background. This framework will measure the relationship between economic capital and the socioeconomic background of the rural community. Using this framework, we will understand the relationship between economic capital and the socioeconomic background of rural communities

Strategic Collaborative Planning for Urban Liveability: A Comparative Review of Metropolitan Area Case Studies

The issue of urban liveability has been extensively debated by global agencies and scholars, as evidenced by the New Urban Agenda, in response to the impact of urbanisation. Urban liveability pertains to the ability of urban communities to achieve a high-quality living environment. While participatory planning is often presented as a means of empowering communities to attain better living conditions, it has presented challenges for decision-makers. Furthermore, dominant actors often influence participation processes, benefiting certain community segments. As a result, collaborative planning has emerged as an approach that seeks to address the interests of multiple urban factors by promoting consensus in decision-making. This paper aims to examine the collaborative planning methods that have been used in strategic planning that have empowered the community to participate in the planning process. Content analysis was employed as a research method to explore the empirical evidence of collaborative planning that has successfully empowered community participation in strategic planning and its impact on the liveability of metropolitan areas. Correspondingly, the Melbourne, Vancouver, and Helsinki case studies were selected based on five liveable city indices. This study's findings suggest a positive correlation between the implementation of collaborative planning by the selected metropolitan areas and their status as the most liveable cities. This paper contributes to the ongoing debate on the role of collaborative planning in promoting urban liveability

Settlement’s Function of Regional Development Corridor in Malaysia: A Case Study of South-East Pahang Development Authority (DARA)

Frontier area development through Township development is one of strategy in the regional development corridors (RDC) that was formulated by the government. In line with the New Economic Policy (NEP) strategy, the development of RDC such as South-East Pahang Development Authority (DARA) in 1971 was focused on improving the living standards and productivity of the rural population through the process of modernizing rural and remote areas. The existence of DARA indirectly catalysed the development of new townships which drove the urbanization process in the South-East Pahang region. However, the dissolution of DARA in 2000 was occurred due to the successful in the development of DARA in South-East Pahang region. Nonetheless, a question emerges whether these new townships are fulfilling to the settlement’s function and performances today that was planned in early setup of DARA. Hence, this paper aims to evaluate the settlement’s function of the township development in the DARA in Malaysia as a case study of RDC. The methodology used is a qualitative method using a case study method on the 11-existing settlement centers located in the DARA area. The findings highlighted that the settlement’s function of these settlement centers have undergone significant changes from the main goal of its establishment with today’s functions and performances due to the factor of population decline and shrinkage of economic opportunity. Therefore, immediate measures are required by the relevance government agencies to ensure the existence of these settlement centers in the future

The impact of regional development towards the well-being of rural community

Since before the British rule, the issues and problems of urban transformation growth have continued until today, especially in rural areas and small towns. Rural communities also have undergone significant transformations in recent decades. There are positive and negative impacts on adaptation the growth of regional development that impact significantly on the rural community, which needs to be addressed to overcome the adverse effects on those that involved. This also included the changes in a case study of rural areas that have been chosen, which is located in sub-district that categorize under rural areas at Johor Bahru due to Iskandar Malaysia region expansions. Furthermore, the developmental transformation has mainly affected the changes in the socio-economic well-being of rural communities. Therefore, the purpose of this paper is to provide an overview of studies on a factor of socio-economic well-being development in rural areas for creating a framework to measure the impact of regional development on the socio-economic well-being of the rural

Local Community Knowledge for Flood Resilience: A Case Study from East Coast Malaysia

Malaysia as a tropical climate country is vulnerable to dreadful climate change events; particularly floods. These frequent occurrences of floods severely affect one or other parts of the country. In reducing disaster risk and strengthening local initiatives towards climate adaptation, vulnerable communities particularly in rural areas have developed valuable local knowledge for flood resilience. This local knowledge is continuously practiced in facing disasters and it is passed down to the next generations. This study aims to examine measures taken by communities based on local knowledge they possessed from the three stages of disaster management cycle namely, before, during and after disaster. Local knowledge as asserted by scholars could complement scientific knowledge and build a comprehensive disaster risk reduction approach for local context implementation. A mixed method approach was adopted; case study method and household survey involving 90 respondents for quantitative data collection and field observation for collecting qualitative data. Three case study areas in East Coast of Malaysia have been selected for further observation including; 1) Lubok Setol village in Kelantan state; 2) Teladas village in Terengganu state; and 3) Gajah Mati village in Pahang state. Findings from this study indicated that all study cases have developed and adopted local knowledge strategiesfor flood preparedness and responses including; 1) agriculture techniques and livestock trading; 2) stock piling of food and other necessities; 3) marking flood level as historical record; 4) floodproofing animal shelter; 5) constructing overhead storage cabinet and outdoor hut, and; 6)saving boats for emergencies. As a conclusion, it is proven that local community knowledge plays crucial roles in reducing disaster risks hence contributing towards building a resilient communit

Strategic Collaborative Planning for Urban Liveability : A Comparative Review of Metropolitan Area Case Studies

The issue of urban liveability has been extensively debated by global agencies and scholars, as evidenced by the New Urban Agenda, in response to the impact of urbanisation. Urban liveability pertains to the ability of urban communities to achieve a high-quality living environment. While participatory planning is often presented as a means of empowering communities to attain better living conditions, it has presented challenges for decision-makers. Furthermore, dominant actors often influence participation processes, benefiting certain community segments. As a result, collaborative planning has emerged as an approach that seeks to address the interests of multiple urban factors by promoting consensus in decision-making. This paper aims to examine the collaborative planning methods that have been used in strategic planning that have empowered the community to participate in the planning process. Content analysis was employed as a research method to explore the empirical evidence of collaborative planning that has successfully empowered community participation in strategic planning and its impact on the liveability of metropolitan areas. Correspondingly, the Melbourne, Vancouver, and Helsinki case studies were selected based on five liveable city indices. This study's findings suggest a positive correlation between the implementation of collaborative planning by the selected metropolitan areas and their status as the most liveable cities. This paper contributes to the ongoing debate on the role of collaborative planning in promoting urban liveability

Assessing Socioeconomic Differentiation of Rural Household Groups in Malaysia

The variation of rural Malaysian household groups is a result of their different socioeconomic backgrounds, as each household group tends to carry its own distinct economic potential. Therefore, in order to plan for the development of rural areas, it is essential to acknowledge the determinants that causes these economic variations to occur. This paper aims to assess the differentiation of rural households’ socioeconomic backgrounds in rural areas of Malaysia, and to highlight a review of relevant studies on 20 identified determinants for the differentiation of households' socioeconomic background according to five capitals (economic, social, human, cultural and environmental) as the fundamental framework in measuring household economic performance. Quantitative approach was used as a method to assess the variation of the determinants that causes the differentiation in socioeconomic backgrounds of household groups. Results from this study reveals the key findings on the levels of socioeconomic backgrounds based on six different household groups in Malaysia

A comparative study of smart city initiatives in Malaysia: Putrajaya and Iskandar Puteri

The Smart City concept has grown exponentially and is rapidly accepted by wider international communities and developed countries. Smart City implementation may lead to a high-quality, more resilient, liveable and sustainable development for a nation. Malaysia's urban population will increase from 74.3% in 2015 to 79.6% in 2025. By 2040, Malaysia is expected to reach 84% of the urbanisation rate. In managing and solving daily urban issues (e.g., congestion, energy, crime, pollution, waste management, etc.), urban planners are searching for implementing Smart Cities as a primary solution. This study aims to investigate two (2) cities’ experiences in implementing these initiatives, namely, Putrajaya and Iskandar Puteri. Both cities act as administrative centres at the national and state levels. Since established in 1995, Putrajaya promoted as the 'Garden City' and 'Intelligent City'. This is followed by the new administrative city of Johor State, Iskandar Puteri (previously known as Nusajaya), officiated in 2009 in the Southern part of Peninsular Malaysia. Both cities introduced their own Smart City blueprint, with 93 strategies in the Putrajaya Smart City Blueprint (2018), and 28 in Smart City Iskandar Malaysia (2012). By comparing the Smart City strategies or initiatives in both areas, this study concludes that Putrajaya’s strategies are more focused on micro-city-level implementation. Iskandar Puteri (in Iskandar Malaysia Development Region) has a brief and wider context at the regional level (macro). In both cities, there are still no clear measurement methods or indicators that can assess the achievement of Smart City initiatives implemented at the local level

Readiness of Transit Oriented Development (TOD) concept implementation in Perak's suburban areas

The transit-oriented development (TOD) concept is a planning strategy in metropolitan areas that involves mixed use of land for transportation systems, especially railway stations, as the basis for planning the TOD concept. The question raised is whether suburban areas are suitable and ready to implement the TOD concept which is included in the suburban districts' local plan. The aim of this paper is to evaluate the readiness of implementing the TOD concept model for 14 suburban railway station areas in seven of Perak's local government administrations. The methodology used is a mixed quantitative and qualitative approach, applying the Fuzzy Delphi Method (FDM) and case study method to develop the readiness model and evaluate the readiness level of the TOD concept in suburban areas. Twenty indicators from 4 key elements in the TOD readiness model were identified, such as population density, transit system, economic development, and land development potential. The findings indicated that all 14 railway stations involved have not yet achieved a 100 per cent level of readiness in implementing the TOD concept model