Sarawak's economic goal for 2030 is a specific figure rather than a slogan. The Office of the Premier puts it at RM282 billion, roughly double the RM136 billion the state government uses as its 2019 starting point, with Sarawak to be a developed and high-income region by the end of the decade. The Department of Statistics Malaysia measured the state's economy at RM153.5 billion in 2025.

What the state has actually committed to

The plan behind the figure is the Post COVID-19 Development Strategy 2030, or PCDS 2030, launched in July 2021. The Sarawak Public Service Commission's page on the strategy describes it as the route to a developed, high-income state by 2030 through innovation and data, with economic prosperity, social inclusion and environmental sustainability as its three stated ends. The Premier's Office states the headline commitment plainly: doubling gross domestic product from RM136 billion in 2019 to RM282 billion in 2030.

Where the economy stands now

The official measure is the Department of Statistics Malaysia's Gross Domestic Product by State release for 2025. It puts Sarawak at RM153.5 billion, up from RM148.2 billion in 2024, a growth rate of 3.6 per cent. The previous release recorded RM142.7 billion for 2023, and put 2024 growth at 3.9 per cent where the newer release now says 3.8 per cent.

Inside that total, the sectors moved in different directions in 2025:

  • Services grew 5.4 per cent, up from 4.8 per cent, driven by wholesale and retail trade, food and beverage and accommodation, and by utilities, transportation and storage and ICT.
  • Manufacturing grew 0.1 per cent, against 1.3 per cent in 2024, held back by petroleum, chemical, rubber and plastic products, which the department notes account for over 80 per cent of the sector.
  • Mining and quarrying grew 2.7 per cent, down from 4.8 per cent.
  • Agriculture grew 4.3 per cent, above the national rate of 2.2 per cent.
  • The natural gas subsector slowed to 0.7 per cent from 5.4 per cent — the main reason, the department says, that national natural gas output moderated to 0.5 per cent.

Sarawak's GDP per capita was RM73,757 in 2025 against a national figure of RM59,167, one of six states above the national level.

What the arithmetic asks for

The distance between RM153.5 billion and RM282 billion is RM128.5 billion, to be covered in five years. That is compound growth of roughly 13 per cent a year. Sarawak recorded 3.6 per cent in 2025. Measured instead from the strategy's own 2019 base, doubling by 2030 implies about 6.9 per cent a year across eleven years.

The target and the measurement come from different bodies, so the comparison shows the scale of the task rather than an audited shortfall. In the same release Johor recorded RM170.9 billion after growth of 8.0 per cent, and Malaysia RM1.74 trillion.

The six sectors and seven enablers the plan runs on

PCDS 2030 is organised around six lead economic sectors and seven enabling areas, as the Public Service Commission sets them out:

  • Sectors: manufacturing, commercial agriculture, tourism, forestry, mining and social services.
  • Enablers: digital transformation, innovation, basic infrastructure, transport, utilities, education and human capital development, and renewable energy.

Speaking in Kapit in June 2026, the Premier described the shift as a move from a resource-based model to a low-carbon, technology-led one, Bernama reported: forests valued as carbon sinks for trading under the mechanism in the 2015 Paris Agreement, artificial intelligence applied to public service delivery, and hydroelectricity and natural gas anchoring a regional green-energy role. He put the human capital side at 64 education and training programmes, and said nearly 5,700km of logging roads would be upgraded for public use over five to six years.

What high-income status measures, and what it does not

Sarawak already holds that status. The Premier's Office records that the World Bank categorised the state as high-income seven years ahead of target, on gross national income per capita above USD13,205 (RM61,442) in 2022, with GNI at RM73,100 in 2024 — a third consecutive year in the category and fourth place nationally.

That is an average across the population rather than a household figure, and a different measure from GDP per capita. State revenue is a third number again: the Premier's Office puts it at RM14.2 billion in 2024, the highest in the state's history and about twice the pre-2017 level.

What is being built, and who is paying for it

Some of the spending is federal. Tabling Budget 2026, the Prime Minister said Sarawak would receive RM6 billion in development allocation, up from RM2.9 billion in 2022, and that the Special Grant for Sabah and Sarawak would rise to RM600 million from RM300 million in 2023, Bernama reported. The same speech set Phase 1 of the Sarawak-Sabah Link Road for completion in November 2026, costed a pavement upgrade between Durin and Salim in Sibu at RM350 million, and described a 3,190km, RM2 billion submarine cable running from Sedili in Johor to Kuching and Sibu before continuing to Sabah.

Some is state-led and sector-specific. Sarawak is targeting 720 business events between 2026 and 2030 with a projected economic impact of RM2.06 billion, having raised its subvention fund by 144 per cent since 2021, Bernama reported. The supporting infrastructure named was the state-owned airline AirBorneo, an expanded Borneo Convention Centre Kuching and a new convention centre in Miri.

Sources