PM Najib: Move towards social innovation

PUTRAJAYA: Malaysia needs to divert its focus from input based investment to knowledge based economy alongside innovation, Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Abdul Razak said.
He said focus should be given to the social innovation approach which would be a direct benefit to this country and its people.
"The success of the national transformation agenda depends very much on our ability to shape new culture based on innovation.
"When we say innovation, many will see it as innovating products or for commercialisation. But social innovation directly affects the people," Najib said at the Prime Minister's Innovation Award ceremony at the Putrajaya International Convention Centre here today.
Explaining the Global Centre for Public Service Excellence Report 2014, he said it is important to firstly, explore social innovation through experiments and secondly, widen channels and accessibility for the people to state their wants and expectations of government services.
"This is equivalent to going to the ground and getting the people's feedback. It helps to find out what their expectations are.
"This way, the civil service would not just be efficient but also provide better satisfaction to the people, who are using public services," Najib said before launching the award ceremony.
The Prime Minister's Innovation Award was conferred to the Finance Ministry for the establishment of the Urban Transformation Centre (UTC), which is a result of a collaboration between government agencies, private sectors and NGOs.
The UTCs were established in less than two months and is one of the government's initiative in line with the Blue Ocean strategy.