The 'empower' programme is in line with the aspirations of our Prime Minister to transform Malaysia into a high-income nation through the development of human capital.

Dato' Jebasingam Issace John, chief executive officer of ECERDC said the 'empower' programme has been extended to Jeli as a result of the successful implementation of the pilot project in Bentong last year which benefited over 1,000 participants.

Jeli was picked for the launch of this programme as it holds good development potential and is home to two higher learning institutions in Universiti Malaysia Kelantan (UMK) and Politeknik Jeli. Jeli also expects to benefit from economic spill-over between Malaysia and Thailand especially with the operations of the new Customs, Immigration and Quarantine (CIQ) Complex at Bukit Bunga.