KUCHING: The Ministry of Welfare, Women and Family Development has exceeded its target for the 1Azam project this year, in terms of participants.
Its target was 7,500 new participants, but it managed to register 7,539 participants instead.
Its minister Datuk Fatimah Abdullah said the participants were household heads, who had registered themselves with e-Kasih.
“As of December 4 this year, we have achieved 100.5 per cent of the target set under the national key performance indicator (NKPI).
“We are confident that the number would continue to rise before the end of this year,” she said when officiating at the Kuching District 1Azam project business matching activity here yesterday.
Fatimah said although the target for next year would be 7,500 new participants, her ministry would try its best to get as many participants as possible so that more people could benefit from the programme and escape the clutches of poverty.
“We are confident of exceeding the target again next year, provided we have enough allocation for the 1Azam project.”
She hoped that from the 7,500 participants of the 1Azam programme, more participants would be able to increase their income of RM300 for six consecutive months.
“We do not want the increase of income to be only for a month and goes down for the remaining months. If the income of the participants can be maintained for six consecutive months, then the income can be considered stable.”
Fatimah said her ministry and implementing agencies would continue to fine tune the 1Azam programme to ensure that the participants were able to market their products.
She said it was very important for the participants and implementing agencies to work together to market their products as this would help them to expand their market and increase their income.
Fatimah also advised the 1Azam participants to work together with government agencies to market their products during Visit Malaysia Year 2014.
Meanwhile, Kuching Resident Abang Shamshudin Abang Seruji, in his welcoming speech, said Kuching had the highest number people registered under e-Kasih.
“For 2012, our target was to have 1,441 1Azam participants in Kuching, which is among the highest in Sarawak.”
As of now, the state has over 90,000 people registered under e-Kasih.