Director Message

Director's Message

Your visit to the website of the Ungku Aziz Centre for Development Studies at Universiti Malaya is very much appreciated, and I would like to extend my most cordial greetings to you.

The Royal Professor Ungku Aziz Chair was established to honor the contributions of Professor Ungku Aziz in the field of education and economic development especially rural development and poverty. The Ungku Aziz Centre for Development Studies (UAC) is created to facilitate the activities of the chair and one of the main trusts in UAC is to promote shared prosperity and work toward ending severe poverty. In this respect the establishment of UAC is timely and it is foreseen to become a critical reference point for academic work, research and consultancy for poverty and development studies with the purpose of providing services to the community and policy makers.

The COVID-19 (coronavirus) pandemic has had a significant impact on Malaysia's economy, particularly on households that were already in a precarious financial position. The welfare of the 40% of the population that is classified as economically disadvantaged (sometimes known as B40) is the primary concern of the government.This low-income category is especially vulnerable to economic shocks, as well as rises in the cost of living and they continue to be at risk.

Because of this, it gives me great pleasure to announce that UAC will take a step forward in assisting the community and the government by utilizing the expertise of distinguished academics and researchers from institutions in Malaysia and throughout the world, in addition to the dedication of our very own research fellows and colleagues. Since 2016, UAC has taken steps to further broaden the scope of development studies to better reflect the interdisciplinary nature of the field, to encourage a greater number of participants, to stimulate the minds of young people, and to move beyond an approach to development that is limited to a single academic discipline. As a result, the UAC has been steadily shifting toward more targeted measures to support the poor and vulnerable with the primary focus being on cooperation with various government agencies.

I really hope that you would bookmark this website and visit it on a regular basis so that you may learn more about the future events, the most recent publications, and the community development research and programs that are available.

Thank you for visiting the UAC@UM website.

Professor Datin Sri Dr. Suhaiza Hanim Dato Mohamad Zailani

Director