{"id":288236,"date":"2025-11-17T05:36:10","date_gmt":"2025-11-17T05:36:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/288236\/"},"modified":"2025-11-17T05:36:10","modified_gmt":"2025-11-17T05:36:10","slug":"in-malaysias-johor-silicon-dreams-meet-parched-realities","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/288236\/","title":{"rendered":"In Malaysia\u2019s Johor, silicon dreams meet parched realities"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a target=\"_self\" class=\"e1yy41x40 ef9u0v01 css-1ankfgb ecgc78b0\" href=\"https:\/\/www.scmp.com\/topics\/malaysia?module=inline&amp;pgtype=article\" title=\"\" data-qa=\"BaseLink-renderAnchor-StyledAnchor\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Malaysia<\/a>\u2019s southern state of Johor is being transformed by a torrent of tech investment.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">Global heavyweights \u2013 Microsoft, Nvidia, ByteDance \u2013 are pouring billions into vast data centres, the digital foundries that underpin the international AI industry and cloud economy.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">For Malaysia\u2019s government, these investments are nothing short of transformative, representing a once-in-a-generation opportunity to vault ahead in Southeast Asia\u2019s technology race.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">But for Johor residents like Muhammad Azrien Mohammad Ali, the future arrives with a simple, daily anxiety: will water still flow from the tap?<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">\u201cThis year I have experienced three water disruptions,\u201d the 35-year-old told This Week in Asia. \u201cThe water supply is there but it is now low compared to before.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"A tanker distributes water to residents in Pontian, Malaysia\u2019s Johor state, after a prolonged water supply cut due to pollution in 2019. Photo: Shutterstock\" data-qa=\"BaseImage-handleRenderImage-StyledImage\" class=\"e1gf69pb2 css-6ikqhs e445x7d0\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/59f874af-ae80-4029-8012-8f9c24275bc9_b6acfad7.jpg\" title=\"A tanker distributes water to residents in Pontian, Malaysia\u2019s Johor state, after a prolonged water supply cut due to pollution in 2019. Photo: Shutterstock\"\/>A tanker distributes water to residents in Pontian, Malaysia\u2019s Johor state, after a prolonged water supply cut due to pollution in 2019. Photo: Shutterstock<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">Earlier this month, almost a million people faced supply disruptions after pollution shut down several treatment plants along the Johor River \u2013 the latest symptom of a long-running water crisis in Malaysia\u2019s most drought-prone state.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Malaysia\u2019s southern state of Johor is being transformed by a torrent of tech investment. Global heavyweights \u2013 Microsoft,&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":288237,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[130629,45,4797,49,48,17110,130631,46,130630,192,6110,130632,130633,130628,130634,3845,63,130636,130635,6494,3849],"class_list":["post-288236","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-economy","tag-abu-bilal","tag-business","tag-bytedance","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-data-centres","tag-ecobotanic","tag-economy","tag-environmentalists","tag-google","tag-indonesia","tag-iskandar-puteri","tag-johor","tag-johor-bahru","tag-johor-river","tag-malaysia","tag-microsoft","tag-muhammad-azrien-mohammad-ali","tag-muhammad-shaqib-bin-shahrilnizam","tag-nvidia","tag-singapore"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/288236","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=288236"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/288236\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/288237"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=288236"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=288236"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=288236"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}