Palm Oil And Healthy Lifestyle: A Study On Young People’s Perception

2015

Abstract

The oil palm industry in Malaysia is currently facing a shortage of manpower. Majority of the workers employed are foreign workers from neighboring countries like Indonesia, Bangladesh, and Myanmar. These foreign workers are described to have a good endurance level to do the jobs relating to oil palm production. However, employing them on a permanent basis is not encouraged as there are several social ills that point to them. Hence, it is timely that the government looks into how the local manpower can can be utilised to contribute to the production and sustainability of the industry in terms of manspower needs. One of the ways proposed by us is to train Malaysian youths who are mainly under achievers at schools. This is because majority of these youths who do not obtain good results tend to migrate to urban areas in search for a livelihood being car wash operators, petrol pam attendants, general and odd job at supermarkets and hypermarkets. Therefore, it is crucial to create awareness among these youths mainly school leavers on the potentials of being trained and employed at oil palm industries. In order to attract the young generation to the oil palm industry and to influence them to work in the sector, the research set these specific objectives:
To promote and develop awareness on palm oil industries and its potentials through school programs that are available for school leavers and to develop oil palm awareness programs at selected schools.
The research will employ a mixed method approach where instruments for data collected will include self-report questionaires, interviews and awareness programs. The subjects are secondary students from selected schools in Selangor and MPOB officials.

Project Leader

Sabariah Mohamed Salleh (Faculty of Social Sciences and Humanities, Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia (UKM), )