Engineering education in rapidly industrialising Malaysia

Malaysia aspires to be a fully industrialised nation by the year 2020. This has brought about a shift from what was predominantly an agriculturally-based economy to a rapidly expanding manufacturing-based one. This shift has brought to the fore the need for a large pool of people, especially engineers, with a strong base in science and technology. The government has embarked on various programmes to launch the bandwagon. This paper describes some of these programmes and measures that have been implemented or are now being planned, with a focus on engineering and engineering education at the tertiary level. Some recommendations are also made for supplementing the programmes already in place