Over RM200 mil came from underwater last year

KOTA KINABALU: Scuba diving had contributed five percent of the total RM4.7 billion receipts to the state’s tourism industry last year.

The 2007 statistics showed that some 40,000 people of whom 30 percent were domestic divers had come to experience the beauty and richness of Sabah’s underwater world, said Borneo Divers and Sea Sports Sdn Bhd managing director Clement Lee.

“Scuba diving has been an upcoming industry in the state although it has only been here for 25 years in terms of professional runs. Nevertheless, we would rather not want to see a rapid increase in the number of domestic and international divers coming to Sabah. The reason being the industry cannot supply trained and qualified workers to meet the demand from an influx of these visitors. Therefore, it is good to always project progress from 10 to 15 percent a year,” he said when met during the two-day (Nov 30-Dec 1) Kids Scuba Camp at Mamutik Island.

Organised by Borneo Divers and its subsidiary Borneo Divers Training Institute, and co-sponsored by Kids Scuba, a diving school from the peninsula, the programme was participated by 65 divers and instructors, including 19 children aged between eight and 12.

Lee said scuba diving could become a blossoming industry as the Ministry of Tourism, Culture and Environment’s direction is focusing on niche market instead of promoting mass tourism.

The good thing, he added, was that the diving industry provided employment for Sabahans where 90 percent of the 1,500 to 2,000 people working in diving tourism are locals.

He said both the state and federal tourism ministries are working to produce highly-skilled human resource to meet the demand of the market, as qualified people are very important to any approach to develop the industry.

“Hopefully, with the effort by the ministries, we will see 80 to 90 percent of trained and qualified divers being spread into the industry. On a better note, their qualification also enables them to acquire jobs in any diving industry in the world,” Lee said.