IT took bilateral summitry at the highest level to revive cross-border free-trade arrangement at the Tebedu-Entikong border crossing between Sarawak and West Kalimantan in Indonesia.
This deal was one of the highlights of the 13th Malaysia-Indonesia Annual Consultation meeting between Prime Minister Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim and Indonesian President Prabowo Subianto in Jakarta this week.
Also present were Sarawak Premier Tan Sri Abang Johari Openg and Sabah Chief Minister Datuk Seri Hajiji Mohd Noor.
Sarawak had long sought to revive the free flow of goods since Indonesia unilaterally stopped it in 2016.
Sarawak set up an inland port early in 2010 because it seemed to make good economic sense to transport goods from Kuching Port to West Kalimantan via the Tebedu inland port rather than all the way from Java.
At its height in 2013, some RM700 million in goods were reported to be traded this way.
Numerous Sarawak missions to Indonesia seeking to reinstate the free-trade arrangement since then had been fruitless.
It, of course, hardly needs stressing that free trade benefits all who engage in it. It also makes geographic sense for transshipment of goods to and from West Kalimantan via Tebedu and Kuching.
Naturally, it also needs to be acknowledged that West Kalimantan has similar aspirations to become a trade transshipment hub with the commissioning of a new deep sea port near Pontianak, the provincial capital.
The new port will also be well-served by land adjoining it, which has been earmarked for the development of industries.
It so happened that a trade delegation from Sarawak led by Deputy Premier Datuk Amar Awang Tengah Ali Hasan was in West Kalimantan and East Kalimantan, also this week.
The main mission was, of course, to deepen the economic relationship not just with West Kalimantan bordering Sarawak but in East Kalimantan where the new Indonesian capital of Nusantara is being developed.
Sarawak has already identified several joint-ventures in developing dams in Kalimantan and even major real estate developer Ibraco Bhd was scouting about for possible projects in Balikpapan, the major city adjoining Nusantara.
Awang Tengah was reportedly also reviewing localities for setting up a Sarawak trade and tourism office in Pontianak. This comes on the heels of the revival of air connectivity between Kuching and Pontianak next month.
There has been much clamour both in Sarawak and West Kalimantan for flights between the two cities to resume after they were stopped during the Covid-19 pandemic.
People-to-people exchanges have come back strongly since as witnessed by the daily long queues at the Tebedu-Entikong main border crossing as well as other secondary border posts.
All these positive developments must be sustained through regular high-level official exchanges, especially in showing to the Indonesian side that free trade and the free flow of people across our common border is not a zero-sum proposition benefiting only one side.
What happened in Jakarta this week also shows that Sarawak and Sabah can and do benefit substantially from close state-federal ties and working in tandem to take the fullest advantage from similarly close Malaysia-Indonesia bilateral ties.
The writer views developments in the nation, region and the wider world from his vantage point in Kuching
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