KUALA LUMPUR,  Nov 6 -- Under the Supplementary Food Programme (RMT) milk will be provided every school day, instead of twice weekly as practiced currently, Finance Minister Tengku Datuk Seri Zafrul Tengku Abdul Aziz said.

In presenting the 2021 Budget in Parliament today, he said this was to ensure that students from low-income families received the essential nutritional requirements for their physical and mental growth.

He said the RMT programme would be improved with an allocation of RM420 million and a portion of the amount would be reserved for local milk producers.

He said, for this year’s budget, the Education Ministry continued to receive the largest allocation of RM50.4 billion or 15.6 per cent of total government expenditure as education is an important investment in ensuring a better quality of life for future generations.

“To ensure a conducive learning environment, RM800 million has been allocated for maintenance  and repair work on government and government-aided schools,” he said adding this was  also for the construction of halls or roofing structures to cater for school assemblies.

“An additional RM725 million will be allocated to upgrade buildings and infrastructure at 50 dilapidated schools. To strengthen special education, RM45 million will be provided for the welfare of students with special needs," he said.

He said for rural Sabah and Sarawak schools, 184 projects would be implemented for construction and installation of new tube wells  at a cost of RM120 million.

Tengku Zafrul said RM14.4 billion has been allocated to the Ministry of Higher Education including RM50 million for repairs of obsolete infrastructure and equipment in public universities.

According to him, another RM50 million has been allocated to upgrade the Malaysian Research and Education Network (MYREN) access line from 500Mbps to 10Gbps to ensure internet connectivity in institutes of higher learning (IPT).

The government would be working with Bank Simpanan Nasional in financing the laptop loan scheme involving RM100 million, to ensure that undergraduates who received loans from the National Higher Education Fund Corporation (PTPTN) are able to study online, he added.

He said the tax relief of up to RM8,000 for the National Education Savings Scheme net savings would be extended until year 2022 to continue to encourage parents to finance cost of their children's higher education.

“A total of RM6 billion has been allocated to enhance Technical and Vocational Training Education (TVET) as well as for various initiatives including providing loans to 24,000 TVET programme participants in public and private skills institutes and increasing the monthly allowance to RM1,000 for the national dual training system participants,” he added.

- BERNAMA