Langkawi Chocolate Museum to open in 2023

PETALING JAYA, July 29 -- The Langkawi Chocolate Museum, which will be developed by DR Group Holdings with an estimated construction cost of about RM15 million, is expected to be completed in 2023.

Plantation Industries and Commodities Minister Datuk Dr Mohd Khairuddin Aman Razali said the planning for the construction of the museum is still in the early stages of ideation process within the Ministry of Plantation Industries and Commodities.

"We will look at it from the point of view of cooperation with the Kedah government. We have obtained prior approval from the state government. We need a one-acre site and as of now, we have already owned 0.6 acre.

"We hope all matters related to the proposal and approval will be resolved within six months and this project can start next year," he told the media after a working visit to the Chocolate Museum @ Kota Damansara here today.

Besides Langkawi, he said the government was also planning to open chocolate hubs nationwide in an effort to make Malaysia a world chocolate hub.

The cocoa sector recorded an export revenue of RM6.6 billion in 2019 with the contribution of the downstream sector of RM1.6 billion to the country's gross domestic product (GDP).

The chocolate manufacturing sector, in particular, recorded an export revenue of RM1.4 billion, which is 17.3 per cent of total export earnings of cocoa products in the same year with an increase of 10.6 per cent over the previous year.

The value of exports of cocoa beans and cocoa-based products for the first five months of this year was RM2.6 billion, an increase of 0.5 percent over the same period in 2019.

However, it is expected that the export revenue contribution of chocolate products will decrease by 18 per cent this year due to the COVID-19 epidemic and implementation of the movement control order (MCO).

To date, there are 53 chocolate and cocoa confectionery companies, comprising four multinational companies and 49 local companies nationwide.

In addition, to strengthen the chocolate manufacturing industry, the ministry has introduced the Malaysian Cocoa Board’s Chocolate Entrepreneur Development Programme in 2013, which until July this year has trained 224 entrepreneurs.

-- BERNAMA