KANGAR: Malaysia must focus on transforming its macroeconomics as a long-term solution to brain drain.
Economy Minister Rafizi Ramli said only by shifting from 'Made in Malaysia' to 'Made by Malaysia' can the nation create more high-income jobs to retain talent.
"There must be a pivot to industries that offer high-income jobs.
"At the ministry level, we always emphasise transforming from 'Made in Malaysia' to 'Made by Malaysia'.
"Under 'Made in Malaysia', we just assemble. But with 'Made by Malaysia', we design products ourselves."
He said this at a press conference after the 13th Malaysia Plan Engagement Session with Perlis civil servants here today.
He was responding to the issue of the Malaysian skilled workers diaspora, especially engineering graduates preferring to work in Singapore for better pay.
Rafizi said the focus should be on addressing the mismatch between demand in the job market and graduates' training.
"For Malaysia to shift from assembly to design, it requires different skill sets.
"Currently, there is a mismatch between talent development and demand in the job market.
"We have a high demand for skilled workers, but we don't have enough talent.
"The unemployment rate among graduates is up to 30 per cent because they study programmes that no longer hire talent.
"So they have to take up jobs that are not relevant to their qualifications. Yet, we have plenty of vacancies in certain sectors."
Rafizi said another factor contributing to brain drain was the fact that most industries were at the middle and lower economic levels.
"We have to accept the fact that our current economic level is not creating enough high-paying jobs because most of our industries are at the middle and lower economic levels.
"These are among issues that must be resolved at the macro level first.
"If we succeed in doing so, over time our job market and talent development will realign with economic requirements. This will mitigate pull factors from Singapore employers."
As a short-term solution, Rafizi said, the government set up the Johor-Singapore Special Economic Zone to create high-paying jobs.
"The Johor-Singapore Special Economic Zone is aimed at ensuring investment in Johor, creating more jobs and enabling our talent to work in Johor even though the companies are from Singapore.
"This will help us retain skilled workers.
"For the long-term solution, we need to resolve macro issues, which is ensuring our economy moves towards 'Made by Malaysia' and creating more high-income jobs.
"This will ensure our talent development is aligned.
"Once we have more high-income jobs in Malaysia, our talent will not work in Singapore."