Brunei Darussalam

The country is currently in the midst of an ambitious agricultural reform campaign designed to ease the Sultanate’s heavy reliance on foreign imports by increasing domestic output of key commodities such as rice, fish, crops and livestock. Limited by a dearth of plantable land – just 1% of Brunei Darussalam’s already small land mass is gazetted for agricultural use – the...

As was the case across most of the region, the Asian financial crisis hit Brunei Darussalam’s construction industry hard towards the end of the 1990s, thinning out the sector as construction companies folded or exited the local market. Since then there has been a resurgence as the government rolled out large health and education initiatives in the 2000s followed by a...

Taking advantage of the rewards reaped from a sustained period of high oil prices, Brunei Darussalam has embarked on several large-scale infrastructure projects that are designed to serve as the foundation of a stronger, more diverse economy. Many of the largest investments are in the ground transport system, which will play a crucial role in the industrial and tourism...

The traditional settlement patterns of Brunei Darussalam looked markedly different 60 years ago, when the vast majority of its citizens resided in water villages built on stilts along the banks of the Brunei River, than they do today in modern Bandar Seri Begawan. When cholera and smallpox epidemics swept through the crowded settlement of Kampong Ayer in 1953, the...

The commitments Brunei Darussalam has made to safeguard its environment are well documented. These include high-profile efforts like participation in the “Heart of Borneo” campaign to preserve a 22m-ha swath of jungle, as well as a recent pledge to allow no more than 1% of the country’s landmass to be converted to agricultural use. Thanks to the wealth afforded by the...