Muslim-majority countries should build their own markets and produce their own technologies to become self-sufficient, Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohammad said on Thursday, APA reports citing Anadolu.
Speaking at a forum during the ongoing Kuala Lumpur Summit, he stressed the importance of technological and industrial progress in national development.
"There are 1.7 billion Muslims. Obviously this is a big market if we decide to source our needs from Muslims and Muslim countries. Then we enrich ourselves.
"But because we [Muslim countries] have not enough products by ourselves, we have to source most of our needs from other countries, and our money flows out. When money flows out, we become poor. But if we source, the things that we need from Muslim countries, then obviously our wealth will stay within the Muslim community, and we become richer," he said.
“That is why among the things that should solve problems of Muslims is to build a market and produce the things and source them from each other but it is important we learn how to produce our own things,” he added.
He underlined that Muslim nations "will forever be playing catch-up" with the rest of the developed world "if we do not start creating and developing our own technologies."
“We have no choice but to start working on this,” he said.
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