Shell Contributes RM11 million for 2011 Malaysian Human Capital Development Programme

Kuala Lumpur - Shell Malaysia is awarding a total of 400 bursaries and 100 scholarships worth RM11 million in 2011 to outstanding young talents in Malaysia, in recognition of their excellent academic achievements and to enable them to pursue pre-university or first-degree courses at approved institutions locally or overseas. The company has invested close to RM140 million on the scholarship programme over the past forty years, to help enable more than 2,000 young Malaysians realise their full academic potential.

This year’s Shell Educational Excellence Awards include a special scholarship category for students with physical disabilities. These special scholarships were launched in 2010 initially for students of Sarawak in conjunction with Shell’s 100 years of Upstream operations in Miri.  Three candidates received the special scholarships today.

The awards ceremony for Peninsula Malaysia based students was officiated by YB Dato’ Saifuddin Abdullah, Deputy Minister II, Ministry of Higher Education today. Anuar Taib, Chairman of Shell Malaysia represented the company. Similar ceremonies will be held in Kuching and Kota Kinabalu for Sarawak and Sabah based students respectively.

In his speech, Anuar Taib said that the company believed that the business community can play an integral role in complementing the government’s efforts to develop and enhance Malaysian human capital.

“Shell recognises that as the country advances towards becoming a high income economy, it will need a larger pool of professionals who are highly qualified and able to make the country more competitive,” he said.

Shell's efforts to enhance Malaysia's talent pool is premised on the idea that businesses must also shoulder the responsibility to implement initiatives to attract, develop and retain skilled human capital along with the government. The scholarship programme is one such programme, and is complemented by other human capacity development initiatives.

Under its Campus Ambassador Programme, Shell provides input to the curricula of the Engineering and Geoscience faculties of a few selected universities in Malaysia. The company also sponsors a chair at University Technology Petronas, and has set up a carbonate research lab at the university.

A recent initiative introduced last year to Malaysia is the Shell Eco-marathon Asia, which brings universities from around Asia to Kuala Lumpur to build the world’s most energy-efficient vehicle.  Shell also sponsors Project LINK in two technical schools in Sarawak, helping to produce specialised welders for Oil & Gas.

The selection of recipients for the bursaries was jointly undertaken by Shell Malaysia and the Ministry of Education. The Shell scholarships are awarded based on merit and are non-binding. 

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For further editorial information, please contact Shell Malaysia Media Relations:

Peing Tajang at 603 2091 2161, email: peing.tajang@shell.com or Stephanie Khoo at 603 – 2091 2115, email: stephanie.khoo@shell.com