KUALA LUMPUR: Former prime minister Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad has raised concerns over the possible lack of government funds needed to execute the recently-tabled 12th Malaysia Plan (12MP).

       “It easy for us to plan but not so easy to for us to implement.

       “First of all, we need money when we want to implement these plans.

       “Do we have enough money for this plan?

       “From what we know, some RM600mil has been spent so far and what we were told is that we have no money left,” he said when debating the 12MP in the Dewan Rakyat on Thursday (Sept 30).

       He also said there were obstacles to the implementation of the 12MP, particularly with regard to helping poor rural farmers.

       “There are other ways of helping rural farmers instead of them giving them money which would eventually bankrupt the government,” he said.

       He also cited the example of a proposal to implement prawn breeding in padi fields to raise the income of rural farmers.

       “Three years have passed and there are (still) questions on how to implement this.

       “They were told it was too dangerous to breed the prawns from China as there was a danger of the prawns escaping in the event of flooding,” he said, adding that the plan was eventually abandoned.

       He also said most of the farmland owned by villagers had fragmented over generations into smaller plots, which were economically unfeasable to develop.

       Dr Mahathir proposed that such plots of land be merged to form large estates to allow better management and returns for the farmers.

       He also suggested more reliance on technology to develop the nation’s agricultural sector.