KUCHING: Sarawak needs to come out with its own State Social Wellbeing Index (SSWI) to cover the whole of state area, said Minister of Welfare, Community Wellbeing, Women, Family and Childhood Development, Datuk Fatimah Abdullah.
She pointed this out during the press conference after chairing the Social Development Council Meeting 2017 at Dewan Perpaduan, Merdeka Palace Hotel here yesterday. It was during this meeting that they came out with ten pillars to be used for the SSWI, Fatimah said.
“Sarawak is a special state in terms of geography, the size of the state and the capacity of the people. Therefore, to reach out to the people, especially those in interior areas, is very difficult and a comprehensive survey needs to be done in order to get the correct index,
“Our state also has multiracial people and cultures compared to the others and a detailed approach is needed for social wellbeing survey,” said the minister.
She said some of the best measures to have a comprehensive survey are by conducting it through district level.
“We have about 40 districts; if it is done to all districts, then it can cover the whole Sarawak. We will have the workshop somewhere in July this year and a pilot project also needs to be done this year before it can be implemented next year,” she disclosed.
On the meeting, they came out with the 10 pillars to be used for the State Social Wellbeing Index (SSWI) namely, Family institution, Capacity Building, Social Harmony, Housing, Social Space and Infrastructure, Good Governance and Practices, Social Responsibility, Environmental Sustainability, Social and Health, and Public Safety.
“Under the 10 pillars, there are about 15 domains and other sub domains. Our SSWI is also comprising the existing indexes as well as created indexes by various agencies in Malaysia such as National Family Development and Community Board and others as well as the other useful indexes from international level and other countries,
“However, the chosen adaptation of the international social wellbeing indexes depends on the existing data and our ability to conduct the research and data collection,” Fatimah explained.
