An agriculture school known as Sekolah Pertanian Lestari(SPL) will be built at Sungai Batang Bt 10, at a cost of RM70 million.
The school, based on Agriculture Science will cover 99 acres, including a plantation and other facilities.
Disclosing this in a press conference here, Assoc.Prof. Dr.Wan Mohd Wan Othman, of Universiti Malaysia Sabah(UMS), said the proposed SPL would serve as a nucleus for the developmment of the Sandakan Education Hub.
It could give rise to various educational and training institution in Sandakan, such as polytechnic, Mara Junior Science College, Inland Revenue Board(IRB) training centre and private college.
The SPL-UMS project would include the setting up of a herb garden, a padi field, ostrich farming and an oil palm plantation.
Dr.Wan also pointed out that the SPL-UMS campus would play a significant role in the development and progress of the agriculture sector in Sabah, or in Borneo for that matter, in line with the vision of the 9th Malaysia Plan.
The curriculum would offer three disciplines of higher learning such as Agriculture Production Programme, Livestock Production Program and Horticulture Programme, as aspired by the goals of the SPL inception.
It was hope that SPL would eventuallly emerge as an only professional centre of learning, research and services in this part of the world, particularly in Agriculture Science, DR.Wan said.
