PARLIAMENT | As part of its aim to attract high-quality foreign direct investments (FDIs) into the country, the government will be looking to improve existing facilities including the Tanjung Agas Oil and Gas and Maritime Park in Pekan, Pahang.

Deputy International Trade and Industry Minister Ong Kian Ming told Awang Hashim (PAS-Pendang) he was unaware of the project's current status but had visited the site two years ago while serving as an opposition MP.

"I have been to the area. The infrastructure is ready but there are no big investments as announced.

"I hope to make a visit to probe why the billions of ringgit announced by the BN government were not realised," said Ong during question time this morning.

Awang had in a supplementary question asked for updates on the Tanjung Agas project which was developed to attract investments to the East Coast Economic Region.

The project was first announced by former Pahang menteri besar Adnan Yaakob in 2009 and he had at the time reportedly said the infrastructures would be developed with an allocation of RM420 million.

However, in May last year, Adnan reportedly denied the project was in trouble, and said that discussion were ongoing with foreign investors keen to use the facilities.

Earlier, Mahdzir Khalid (BN-Padang Terap) pointed out that there are many existing industrial parks in Malaysia, for example the Kulim High Tech Park, with potential to attract a large amount of FDIs.

Meanwhile, Ong also announced that the country had managed to attract RM25.2 billion worth of FDIs from January to June this year.

From the figure, Ong said the biggest portion of RM15.2 billion was from the manufacturing sector, followed by the services sector (RM6 billion) and the primary industries sector (RM5.3 billion).

In terms of FDI source, he said China had contributed RM6.6 billion, South Korea (RM2.4 billion), Japan (RM1.6 billion) and Singapore (RM800 million).

He added that the government is committed to maintaining business-friendly policies and has embarked on various trade missions to promote Malaysia's potential as an attractive investment destination.