MAHA 2010 Expo

I went to the MAHA 2010 Expo, which was the first time I've been to an agricultural event in Malaysia.

MAHA, Malaysian Agriculture, Horticulture and Agrotourism holds an expo every 2 years, and it is Malaysia's leading agricultural show. Hosted by Ministry of Agriculture and Agrobased Industries and organised by the Federation Agriculture Marketing Authority (FAMA), it is amongst the largest and most comprehensive of its kind in the region. Entry is free. It was opened by the PM

MAHA 2010 runs for 10 days starting November 26th 2010. I went with friends on Fri 3 Dec, and we were so lucky as it was the first day of the week not to have monsoon rain.

There are 3 large exhibition halls, but the rest of the exhibits etc are scattered over a huge area. It is held at The Malaysian Agro Exposition Park Serdang (MAEPS), which is Asia’s largest showground and exposition facility and is owned by the Ministry of Agriculture and Agro-based Industry, Malaysia.

My friends had been in 2008, and said this year the car parking was much better, and there were free tractor-drawn trams to take visitors from car park to the main exhibition halls.

From there, diesel powered trams and a fleet of Rapid buses operated a shuttle service around the area.

It was a bit confusing knowing exactly how to get where, as the bus destinations were not comprehensive enough. But it was a delight to see Malaysians actually qeueing for the buses and trams. Even in the hot sun, they queued in an orderly fashion! Rare sight - a queue =

There are demonstrations, exhibits and activities for trade visitors as well as general public. It shows Malaysia's best producers, farmers, fishermen and stockmen, as well as the regions' best agro-food companies.

The 4 main exhibition halls had all kinds of things on display and for sale. We were quite surprised at the range of Malay products, for food and medicinal and cosmetic use. Twice I got grabbed by women who rubbed cream onto my hand before I realised what was happening - some wonder cream that is supposed to do everything good for the skin! I didn't succumb and buy any, even though the clever salesgirls kept dropping the price!

MAHA bottles

colourful plant gel

Malay herbs

Buah Tonjak Langit

The food floor had vast amounts of different products, even with a frozen section. Many stalls were selling coffee and although I had several samples, I wasn't tempted to buy any. The main food court was on the ground floor and had dozens of stalls selling foods from all the states of Malaysia. It was really hard to make a choice without overeating. Chocolate fountain -

Malay shortbread!

There were many stalls set under white canopies selling all kinds of produce.

Negeri Sembilan pavilion
Further round were pavilions representing each of the states of Malaysia. Negeri Sembilan music -

My favourite was Perlis, simply because of the python!

yellow ringed cat snake

I found the music rather loud in each pavilion, and even outside there was loud piped music which was unnecessary. Not to mention the very loud DJ in the food court who was just listing the foods available.

The edible food gardens were good, full of vegetables and herbs, and "flowers" made out of vegetables. fat chillies with black leaves

cabbage flowers

1Malaysia

orchids

oil palm

Near the lake was a hall dedicated to fish farming. And several stalls selling pets such as rabbits as well as fish.

Crowded cages, hot bunnies

My main interest was the animal section. I was looking forward to it, but the animals were restricted to cattle, sheep and goats.

Boer

lots of steaks there!

I knew there wouldn't be pigs, but I had hoped there might be other animals such as deer and even ostrich as these are now farmed in Malaysia. I don't know if there were poultry or if we missed it. We did see 2 goats being spit roasted -

We went onto the childrens' petting areas, which had a few places where kids could pay RM3 to pet a rabbit. I was very amused to see a rabbit satay stall next to the petting area!

There was a hall with cats and pet supplies, and another petting area with various animals and birds for kids to touch.

I missed the displays of agricultural machinery and equipment. There was a small mock 'swiftlet house' with very loud piped bird calls that penetrated to the open air food court. Sarang burung walit is a big industry all over Malaysia now.

We decided to take a shuttle bus to get back, so joined a long queue, though it moved quite fast

State flags -

walkway.
I loved the food names -

There were toilets in the car parks -

Last look as we took the tractor back to our car park -

© Liz Price
No reproduction without permission