Conceptually, the local community in rural area of Sabah owns a typical form of mindset which indirectly inhibits them from sculpting success in life. Once this barrier is broken, more great opportunities can be explored. Therefore, this paves the way for BEST Society to organize a personal development seminar for the local community which entitled Mindset Development Seminar.This fruitful seminar was successfully held on the 13th of November 2010 at Pusat Kemahiran Komuniti Bestari (Smart Community Skills Centre), Kg. Hobut, Kudat. A total of 50 participants attended the seminar which involved Head of villages and Chairman of Jawatankuasa Kemajuan & Keselamatan Kampung, JKKK (Village Development & Safety Committee). This seminar was led and facilitaed by Mr. Lam Kee Hing, who regularly conducts personal and leadership development courses especially for indigenous leaders and communities in Sabah, as well as in Sarawak and West Malaysia.

This topic for this seminar was “CHANGE YOUR MINDSET, CHANGE YOUR LIFE”. Among the crucial points elaborated by Mr. Lam during his seminar was the fact that to be a successful individual, it is not the matter how much money the person has or the academic qualifications he owns, but, it is the capacity of knowledge that has grown within one’s mind. The main point is, people need to start changing their own mindset before the conditions of their lives can start to change for the better. He identified 10 negative mindsets prevalent among indigenous people which have seriously hindered their personal and community development. Among them are negative mindset, narrow thinking, short-term thinking, half-hearted attitude, easily satisfied mentality, victim mentality, crab mentality, (attitude of “if I can’t have it, neither can you”) and short cut mentality. He then suggested different practical ways to overcome these negative mindsets.

For this seminar, participants were required to invest RM10.00 per person for the seminar materials. This is intentionally done to break the subsidy (“everything for free”) mentality. Based upon their feedback at the end of the seminar, this program has definitely helped the community to realise their limitations and begin to see possibilities as they begin to change their mindset from negative to positive.

A total of RM1100.00 was spent by BEST Society to conduct this seminar.

BEST Society continues its active involvements in community projects by jointly organizing a seminar with the Small and Medium Enterprise (SME) Bank on 10th of August 2010 in Kudat. The one day seminar was successfully organized in Kg. Pinawantai Handicraft Center, Matunggong District, of which, three SME Bank officers conducted the session, headed by Mr. Rosie Kassim as SME’s Branch Manager along with Mr. Augustine Jumat and Ms. Aini Aucasa.The seminar was aimed to educate the local community on the SME Bank’s services including detailed lessond on steps to fill up application forms so that they are more prepared to start up businesses on their own. During the seminar Mr. Augustine explained about the Rural Economy Funding Scheme (Skm Pembiayaan Ekonomi Desa, SPED) which is relevant for the local Rungus community in the rural area to apply. The seminar was attended by 61 people from 21 different villages and out of these total numbers, only 6 were people from 21 different villages and out of these total numbers, only 6 were men. As usual, this was a sharp contrast of gender during the seminar, where the women paricipants far outnumbered the male participants. To narrow the gender gap, it is our aim that more male participants will enroll in entrepreneurship development skills programs offered by BEST Society in near future. Among the villages involved were Kg. Kimihang, Kg. Tinangol. Kg. Ppopot, Kg. Lajong, Kg. Tinutudan, Kg. Minyak, Kg. Bangau, Kg Mompolis and Kg. Hobut.

A post-mortem was conducted as a wrap up session and the overall responses received showed that the participants were satisfied and grateful for the opportunity presented to them. For example, Mr Yaidey Golok from Kg. Pinawantai is now aware and exposed to the financing strategies which would enable him to capitalize on his consummate coconut craftmanship for business. Through the opportunity provided, he would be one f the potential entrepreneurs among the local community. This beneficial seminar cost a total of RM1200.00 for its overall expemditures and was funded by GEF-SGP UNDP as part of the capacity building effort.

In addition to this seminar, the participants suggested that BEST Society invite Agro Bank to organize similar seminar, since loan for Agriculture Businesses is not offered by SME Bank. Due to positive feedbacks from the seminar, BEST Society will arrange a study trip to SME Bank Industrial Park in Lok Kawi, Kota Kinabalu, Sabah as a business exposure and opportunity for selected participants.

A Virgin Coconut Oil (VCO) processing workshop was successfully organized by BEST Society on the 21st – 22nd October 2010 at the KimihingVCO Processing Center, Kudat. This center was built through the funding from Kementerian Pembangunan Luar Bandar Sabah. The two days workshop was funded by Global Environment Facility Small Grant Program (GEF SGP) through its capacity building activities.The head of Unit Kelompok Pengusaha VCO Kampung Kimihang, Kudat, Mr. Ronnie Onginjan from Kimihang Agro Enterprise was the trainer during the two days workshop. The main objective of this workshop is to teach participants on how to extract virgin coconutoil through fermentation & grated coconut pressing. A number of 31 participants (comprising 6 men and 25 women) from a total of 6 village namely Kg. Kimihang, Kg. Rondomon, Kg. Hobut, Kg. Pinawantai, Kg. Bangau, Kg. Bonduk, Kg. Tinagol participated in this fruitful workshop.

This two days workshop was officiated by Kudat ADO, En. Yasin Nasir on behalf of Kudat District Officer, En. Sebastian Lim. In his speech, he express his gratitude to BEST Society for assisting the local community in Kimihang, Kudat and he will definitely give extra support to such industrious initiative. Manager of BEST Society, Aaron Charles added in his speech that this non-profit organization under Borneo Eco Tours / Sukau Rainforest Lodge will continue to assist the locals of Kudat in terms of technical and management skills, for instant in packaging as well as designing promotional materials. It was agreed that the VCO brand will be named Borneo Natural Coconut Oil or in short, BONCO.

BEST Society has allocated funds in getting Sirim and Halal certification for the products. Mr Ronnie Onginjan also mentioned that this project gained full support from Kudat District Officer, Sebastian Lim who has sent a proposal to the State Development Unit in Kota Kinabalu to fund the VCO downstream product processing workshop such as lotion, soap, candle and massage oil.

At the end of the workshop, all the participants expressed their positive feedbacks and appreciation. Total expenditure spent for this eorkshop was RM2420.