Sun 13 Feb 2011: 7.00am - The Battle of Pasir Panjang Commemorative Walk from habitatnews
2 Feb is World Wetlands Day 2011
from wild shores of singapore
Will Chek Jawa survive the incessant rain?
from wild shores of singapore
Not your usual frog
from The annotated budak
Antics of a juvenile Black-crowned Night Heron
from Bird Ecology Study Group
Monday Morgue: 31st January 2011
from The Lazy Lizard's Tales
Esther Ng Today Online 31 Jan 11;
SINGAPORE -No shark's fin on your Lunar New Year menu?
A local marine conservation group, Project: FIN, has launched a campaign on social networking site, Facebook, asking people to change their profile picture to one which says: Celebrate Chinese New Year with no shark's fin soup.
Since the launch last Wednesday, the group claims the campaign has spread globally, attracting more than 20 organisations such as Shark Rescue from the United States and the Hong Kong Shark Foundation.
Project: FIN founder Jennifer Lee told MediaCorp: "Some restaurants have put baby shark's fins on the menu and that's very worrying because adult shark population is declining due to increased demand for shark's fin in Asia."
The depletion of stock is compounded as sharks take many years to mature and produce few young.
This means that their populations are slow to recover once over-fished.
WWF Singapore, an environmental group, noted on its website that Singapore was the second largest shark fin trading nation and was not aware of any shark fisheries that were sustainably managed.
"Given the critical situation facing our sharks, we recommend for the Singapore public to stop consumption of shark's fin and other shark products," it said.
But restaurateurs told MediaCorp that they would still continue to serve shark's fin as long as there was a demand for it.
Seafood chain Jumbo group's general manager Ang Kiam Meng, who is also the president of Restaurant Association of Singapore, said: "It's a question of demand and supply and people are looking forward to eating the dish this (Lunar) New Year."
He told MediaCorp that several customers had walked out of Singapore Seafood Republic - a combined venture between The Jumbo Group, Palm Beach, Tung Lok and Seafood International restaurants at Resorts World Sentosa (RWS) - when they learnt that shark's fin was not served.
RWS is one of the resorts in the world with restaurants that do not serve shark's fin.
Project: FIN hopes that with more education and awareness, more people would give up eating shark's fin.
Said Ms Lee: "As we progress with time, it is important that people recognise that the importance of cultural practices should not supercede the importance of maintaining sustainability, as the Earth's resources are not inexhaustible."
Don't eat shark's fin, urges group
Esther Ng Channel NewsAsia 30 Jan 11;
SINGAPORE: A local marine conservation group, Project: FIN, has launched a campaign on social networking site Facebook, asking to people to change their profile picture to one which says: Celebrate Chinese New Year with no shark fin soup.
Since the launch last Wednesday, the group claims the campaign has spread globally, attracting more than 20 organisations such as Shark Rescue from the United States and the Hong Kong Shark Foundation.
Project: FIN founder Jennifer Lee told MediaCorp: "Some restaurants have put baby shark's fins on the menu and that's very worrying because adult shark population is declining due to increased demand for shark's fin in Asia".
The depletion of stock is compounded as sharks take many years to mature and produce few young.
This means that their populations are slow to recover once overfished.
WWF Singapore, an environmental group, noted on its website that Singapore was the second largest shark fin trading nation and was not aware of any shark fisheries that were sustainably managed.
"Given the critical situation facing our sharks, we recommend for the Singapore public to stop consumption of shark fin and other shark products," it said.
But restauranteurs told MediaCorp they would still continue to serve shark's fin as long as there was a demand for it.
Jumbo group's general manager Ang Kiam Meng, who is also the president of Restaurant Association of Singapore, said: "It's a question of demand and supply and people are looking forward to eating the dish this New Year".
He told MediaCorp that several customers had walked out of Singapore Seafood Republic - a combined venture among The Jumbo Group, Palm Beach, Tung Lok and Seafood International restaurants at Resorts World Sentosa (RWS) - when they learnt that shark's fin was not served.
RWS is one of the resorts in the world with restaurants that do not serve shark's fin.
Project: FIN said it hopes that with more education and awareness, more people would give up eating shark's fin.
Said Ms Lee: "As we progress with time, it is important that people recognise that the importance of cultural practices should not supercede the importance of maintaining sustainability, as the Earth's resources are not inexhaustible".
-CNA/wk
More about the Facebook campaign
Straits Times 31 Jan 11;
HEAVY rain drenched most of the island yesterday, causing flash floods in at least five areas, mostly in the east.
National water agency PUB said it received reports of floods on the Tampines Expressway slip road at Tampines Avenue 12 and near the Punggol exit, Airport Boulevard, one stretch of Ang Mo Kio Avenue 5 and Changi Village.
Upon checking these sites, its officers found localised chokes in the drainage along Airport Boulevard, Ang Mo Kio Avenue 5 and in Changi Village. Lanes along Airport Boulevard and at the junction of Tampines avenues 9 and 12 had to be closed for one to two hours.
At Block 384A in Tampines Street 32, a multi-storey carpark that was shin-deep in water, workers were pumping out water from its basement level.
Although the rain yesterday was islandwide, the eastern area around Changi and Pulau Ubin was the wettest. As at 7.50pm yesterday, 200.8mm of rain had pelted down on Pulau Ubin, and 178mm in Changi.
The usual 'hot spots' - Bukit Timah and Upper Thomson - were spared from floods yesterday, as was Orchard Road, parts of which went under water twice in the middle of last year.
Bridge under construction at Punggol The Waterway collapses
A partially completed bridge at the construction site opposite his house collapsed under the weight of rainwater on Sunday morning, reported The Straits Times Reader Simon Low who took and sent in a picture from his flat in Block 638b Punggol Drive.
In an email report to The Straits Times website, Mr Low wrote: 'This morning, I noticed part of the bridge had collapsed due to the heavy rain.
'I believe the bridge also acted as a dam, but the water overflowed (from the right side) the partially built bridge, and pushed the bridge away.
'The banks of the waterway on the right side of the bridge overflowed due to this morning's heavy rain. I wonder whether it will happen again once the waterway is fully completed.'
Wet weekend
Today Online 31 Jan 11;
Incessant rain over the weekend caused flooding in many places in the eastern and north-eastern areas of the city.
Singapore's Meteorological Services Division said widespread moderate to heavy rain was expected to end yesterday.
According to PUB, flash floods occurred yesterday in several areas, including Airport Boulevard, Changi Village, the slip road near Tampines Avenue 12, TPE slip road near the Punggol exit and Ang Mo Kio Ave 5 leading to Buangkok Green industrial Park. The rain also flooded the basement of a multi-storey carpark at Tampines Street 32.
The National Environment Agency (NEA) said current conditions were not expected to last until the Chinese New Year period this week. However, it has forecast short duration showers over the holidays.
The weather forecast for next week will be released today, the NEA said.
Flash floods in several areas
Channel NewsAsia 30 Jan 11;
SINGAPORE: The PUB said flash floods had occurred in several areas on Sunday, amid continued widespread moderate to heavy rain.
These areas included Airport Boulevard, Changi Village, the slip road near Tampines Avenue 12, the TPE slip road near the Punggol exit, and Ang Mo Kio Ave 5, leading to Buangkok Green industrial Park.
The Singapore's Meteorological Services Division said the rain was expected to continue till midnight.
PUB said earlier that flash floods may occur in low-lying areas in the event of heavy rain.
-CNA/ac/wk
Expect a wet CNY weekend
Gerrard Lai my paper AsiaOne 31 Jan 11;
REMEMBER to take along an umbrella when you make your Chinese New Year rounds later this week.
Wet weather over the weekend is expected to continue into the week, with "short-duration showers" forecast in the afternoons from tomorrow to Friday, said the National Environment Agency (NEA) yesterday.
Heavy rain last Saturday caused flooding in several parts of Singapore, including Tampines, Punggol and Changi Village, said national water agency PUB.
The rain also caused the temporary closure of some roads. Two of four lanes of Airport Boulevard Road, leading to the airport, were closed for less than two hours, police said.
As traffic was light at the time of the road closure, vehicle movement was largely unaffected, said a police spokesman.
Other roads affected by the flood included the slip road leading to Tampines Expressway (TPE) near Tampines Avenue 12, as well as Punggol Road near the Punggol exit along the TPE.
Elsewhere, Ang Mo Kio Avenue 5 and Airport Boulevard Road were also flooded for between 10 minutes and an hour, said PUB.
Explaining the cause of the floods, PUB officers told my paper that the heavy rain had swept fallen leaves, among other things, into the grating of drain inlets by the roads. This prevents the rainwater from flowing into the drains.
Meanwhile, several residents who had parked their vehicles at the basement level of a multi- storey carpark at Block 384A, Tampines Street 32, woke up to find their set of wheels sitting in water yesterday morning.
The carpark basement was flooded as early as 8pm last Saturday and the water level "surged to as high as mid-shin level", said technician Hadi Ahmad, 54.
Another resident, Mr Mohamad Fitri, could not use his motorbike yesterday, as it was parked in the basement.
Said the 45-year-old aircraft technician: "I hope to retrieve my bike...after the water subsides."
However, he could still use his car which was parked at a higher level of the carpark.
In its response to my paper queries, NEA said that the region has been "experiencing the effects of a North-east Monsoon surge" for the past few days.
This refers to a surge of cold air from an intense high-pressure area over Northern China, which results in a strengthening of winds over the region, said NEA.
That brings "widespread moderate to heavy rain and occasionally windy conditions to Singapore", the agency said.
The flood that hit Labis this time has been described by some residents as among the worst in the last few years, and worse than the flood in 2006.
Water levels in Johor rivers up, with three bursting their banks
Austin Camoens and Sharin Shaik The Star 31 Jan 11;
JOHOR BARU: Water levels in Johor rivers are rising dangerously, raising fears of a repeat of the 2006 floods that left the state inundated and with damages worth millions in its wake.
The Meteorological Department warned late Saturday afternoon of heavy rain over Muar, Ledang, Segamat, Kluang, Batu Pahat, Mersing, Kota Tinggi, Kulaijaya, here and in the Pontian areas.
According to the Department of Irrigation and Drainage Malaysia (DID) online river level data, three in Johor burst their banks yesterday. Sungai Muar, Sungai Benut and Sungai Mengkibol overflowed at 5.50pm.
However, if the downpour continued, the department warned that five more rivers – Sungai Bekok, Sungai Lenik, Sungai Senggarang, Sungai Johor and Sungai Plentong – would also overflow today.
DID deputy director-general Datuk KJ Abraham said the department was monitoring the river levels and was prepared for any eventuality.
“Every district has an office that will set up an evacuation centre to help the affected in the event of a flood,” he said.
In Kota Tinggi, four families from Kampung Sungai Berangan were evacuated at 6am yesterday as the water level at Sungai Berangan rose to a dangerous level.
In Pasir Gudang, more than 20 houses were knee-deep in water as the drainage system there could not cope with the increase in water near Taman Kota Puteri.
The Pasir Gudang highway was flooded and caused a massive jam while 100m of the Masai Lama-Kong Kong road, just before the Octville Golf Resort in Seri Alam, was impassable to vehicles.
Public Advised Not To Use Labis-Segamat Road
Bernama 30 Jan 11;
LABIS, Jan 30 (Bernama) -- The public is advised not to use the Labis-Segamat Road, especially the bridge at Kampung Lembah Bakti, Jalan Taman Tenang, here, due to the swift current.
According to a statement from the Johor National Security Council emailed to Bernama Sunday, the flood water current in the area was swift and the road and bridge were therefore not passable to traffic.
Labis, including the Tenang state constituency which was having a by-election today, was hit by flood following incessant rain since early Sunday.
Rain, sometimes heavy interspersed with drizzles, has been pouring since six days ago, causing flooding in other areas of Johor like Segamat, Ayer Hitam and Yong Peng.
The flood that hit Labis this time has been described by some residents as among the worst in the last few years, and worse than the flood in 2006.
-- BERNAMA
KTM Intercity Train Services To East Coast And South Disrupted By Floods
Bernama 30 Jan 11;
KUALA LUMPUR, Jan 30 (Bernama) -- Keretapi Tanah Melayu (KTM) Intercity train services to the East Coast and South have been disrupted by floods and landslide caused by heavy rain.
KTM Berhad in a statement here Sunday said train services involving Senandung Sutera (Singapore-Kuala Lumpur Sentral), Senandung Sutera (Kuala Lumpur Sentral-Singapore), Senandung Timuran (Singapore-Tumpat) and Senandung Timuran (Tumpat-Singapore) have been cancelled.
For services involving Ekspres Wau (Kuala Lumpur Sentral-Tumpat), train services will start from Kuala Lipis to Tumpat and passengers from Kuala Lumpur Sentral to Kuala Lipis and back would be ferried by 13 buses.
The statement added that services to central and northern regions were not affected.
"Services to the East Coast and South had to be cancelled as a precaution to ensure safety of passengers as it would be risky to allow trains to use the tracks when submerged by flood waters," said the statement.
Passengers who bought tickets but were affected by the cancellation can either change their date of travel or reclaim the tickets that they had bought.
The public can contact the KTM services at 1-300-88-5862 for more details.
-- BERNAMA
Johor floods: Two dead and over 37,000 evacuated
Nelson Benjamin The Star 31 Jan 11;
JOHOR BARU: Two people have died and 37,493 were evacuated to 200 centres statewide by 4pm Monday as continuous rain in the past few days flooded many parts of Johor.
Segamat, Johor Baru and Kluang were the worst-hit areas and the bad weather was expected to continue on Tuesday, said Johor Mentri Besar Datuk Abdul Ghani Othman on Monday.
All of Segamat is cut off by floodwaters. It is an island.
Police said no one can get in or out of the town as the roads to Muar, Johor Baru and Kuala Lumpur are under water.
Tenaga Nasional Berhad (TNB) has disconnected electricity supply to Segamat. Its substations have been switched off as a safety precaution.
A TNB spokesman said Monday that it was a common procedure during a flood to prevent electrocution. The supply will be restores once the floodwaters ebb to a 'safe level'.
Roads in Labis town, which was flooded Sunday, are clearing but the outskirts are still submerged.
According to the Department of Irrigation and Drainage Malaysia (DID) online river level data, three in Johor burst their banks Sunday. Sungai Muar, Sungai Benut and Sungai Mengkibol overflowed.
With the downpour continuing, the department is closely watching five more rivers – Sungai Simpang Kiri at Sri Medan, Sungai Bekok, Sungai Johor at Rantau Panjang are at a dangerous level.
Meanwhile, Reuters reported that rain-driven floods have disrupted Malaysian oil palm estates from transporting the vegetable oil to refineries and ports in key producing states of Sabah and Johor.
Planters said Monday that as much as 60,000 tonnes of crude palm oil heading to refineries in Sabah on Borneo island have been delayed as floods make it difficult for trucks to get through the estate roads, said two planters from the top producing state.
The transport delay to Malaysia's key palm oil export port of Pasir Gudang in Johor has slowed the transport and loading of cargoes, refiners said, according to Reuters.
Malaysia floods disrupt KTM train services
Channel NewsAsia 30 Jan 11;
SINGAPORE: KTM train services between Singapore and Johor have stopped temporarily due to floods in Malaysia.
This was according to the KTM office in Johor.
MediaCorp understands that train services were disrupted since 3pm on Sunday.
-CNA/wk
Jurong Aromatics complex to start building in March
Its US$1.56b finance package will be inked in mid-Feb
Ronnie Lim Business Times 31 Jan 11;
THE coming two months will see a couple of earlier-planned multi-billion dollar investments on Jurong Island finally fall into place.
Jurong Aromatics Corporation (JAC) is set to start construction of its US$2.4 billion aromatics complex in March, sources said, once its US$1.56 billion financing package is signed by the middle of February.
And Sembcorp - which has been contracted by JAC to supply it with steam, water and wastewater treatment services - is also set to sign off on a $900 million EPC deal with Alstom to expand its cogeneration capacity by some 800-megawatts this quarter, BT understands. This will double its cogen capacity to 1,615 MW, giving it economies of scale to better compete.
A source said that JAC has scheduled a debt package signing after the coming Lunar New Year holidays with 'some 11 banks, plus two Korean governmental groups' - with the latter being the Export-Import Bank of Korea and Korea Trade Insurance Corp.
This follows a roadshow last November which saw the JAC financing deal, jointly led by ING Bank and Royal Bank of Scotland, being fully subscribed to by apparently mainly European banks.
'Construction of the JAC complex will now start in March, with completion expected in 36 months,' the source added.
This means that the world-scale project - which will produce 1.5 million tonnes per annum of aromatics and 2.5 million tpa of transport fuels - will now come on-stream in early-2014. This is some three years later than it had earlier planned, as the project ran smack into the global credit crunch in 2009.
Sembcorp - which earlier indicated it would not build new capacity pending securing customers - now has the justification, with the JAC project steaming ahead, and Germany's Lanxess already building its synthetic rubber plant.
But as the genco's utilities deals with JAC and Lanxess are mainly for steam and wastewater treatment, Sembcorp will approach its expansion judiciously, and carry it out in two phases. 'The first 400 MW is expected to come on-stream end-2013, with the second coming later,' a source said, explaining that 'a 800MW expansion all at once will be too lumpy, especially given the many other power plants coming on at the same time'.
The 800MW cogen expansion is an addition to Sembcorp's announcement last August to build a $800 million multi-utilities complex next to an earlier-planned $40 million wastewater treatment plant at the island's Tembusu sector. The project, on a 5.3-hectare site, included initially a cogen plant producing 400MW of power and 200 tonnes per hour of steam.
The additional 400MW to be added will put Sembcorp on a stronger footing to compete with new power/utility plants coming up there.
China Huaneng-owned Tuas Power is currently building a $2 billion clean coal/biomass multi-utilities complex on Jurong Island to supply steam and cooling water to Lanxess, while on the mainland, it is also expanding its capacity to supply utilities to new investors like Renewable Energy Corporation and Neste Oil.
YTL-owned PowerSeraya has also entered the utilities game, having recently completed building 800 MW of new cogen capacity, while KepCorp is boosting its current 500MW of capacity in Tembusu to 1,300 MW. New player GMR is also building its new 800MW Island Power station there.
Defunct biodiesel plants get new lease of life
New owners recycle plants on Jurong Island to make other products, like chemicals
Ronnie Lim Business Times 31 Jan 11;
(SINGAPORE) A new wave of 'recycling' is taking place on Jurong Island.
Defunct first-generation (1-G) biodiesel plants - which became uneconomical when palm oil prices soared - are being revived as new owners upgrade them to make other products like chemicals used for oil and gas drilling.
The 'rejuvenation' of Northfield-based Stepan Company is the first of these. After acquiring Peter Cremer's 100,000 tonnes per annum (tpa) methyl ester plant in July last year, the American chemicals company is currently upgrading it and installing another fractionation column at the Singapore plant to potentially double its capacity to 200,000 tpa.
The plant's upgrading and expansion, scheduled for completion in February next year, will enable Stepan to produce surfactants used in oilfields. Stepan's surfactants are used in three major oilfield market segments, including drilling, production and stimulation. Methyl esters are for instance used as solvents in drilling fluids.
Another Jurong Island 1-G biodiesel plant which looks set to go the same route is the $130 million Jurong Island plant (once touted as the world's largest biodiesel facility) of Australian-owned Natural Fuel Pte Ltd. The plant which folded up in late-2009 is understood to have changed hands recently. But no details are available at this time.
President and CEO of Stepan, F Quinn Stepan Jr said at the time of its acquisition of Peter Cremer that: 'Methyl esters are a core building block of Stepan's surfactant business and the acquisition of this asset on Singapore's Jurong Island provides a great opportunity to reach our global customer base with methyl esters (ME) and value added derivatives.'
'Our plan is to install methyl ester fractionation capability on the site in order to supply our customers and our internal surfactant needs globally with fractionated methyl esters and derivatives made from tropical oils available in the region.'
The financial terms of the acquisition of the US$20 million plant - previously a joint venture involving Germany's Peter Kremer and Malaysia's Kulim Berhad - were not disclosed.
Stepan just over a week ago awarded a $14.6 million contract to Rotary Engineering to build a new four-storey 50,000 tpa (expandable to 100,000 tpa) fractionated ME plant and also upgrade the existing plant. The plant is expected to tap raw materials like palm oil and coconut from this region.
The early 1-G plants here like Natural Fuel and Peter Cremer, and a third plant belonging to Continental BioEnergy, essentially fell victim to soaring palm oil prices. Palm oil prices had tripled to US$1,400- plus a tonne by March 2008 from US$450 a tonne around 2005/06 when the Jurong Island plants first started.
Given also stiff competition from the many rival biodiesel plants in neighbouring palm oil producing countries, Malaysia and Indonesia, Singapore has been promoting more advanced 2-G plants, or second generation plants, with biofuels developed from non-edible or discarded plant parts.
Finland's Neste Oil which expects to ramp up its just-started $1.2 billion biodiesel plant at Tuas to full production by mid-year, exemplifies such 2-G technology.
Its 800,000 tpa Singapore plant - the largest in the world, with an identical new twin plant in Rotterdam starting up also around mid-year - produces biodiesel from 100 per cent renewable materials like palm oil and animal fat. Its advanced 2-G refineries allow Neste Oil to produce biodiesel from straight processing of the raw materials.
The Economic Development Board, in a background note to a recent tender for a consultant, said: 'EDB believes bio-based feedstocks could add a new dimension of chemical feedstock option on Jurong Island. The fast-growing bio-based chemicals industry would also create new economic opportunities for Singapore.'
Esther Ng Today Online 31 Jan 11;
SINGAPORE - Residents living at St George's Lane can now look forward to rain gardens and a canal with a more "natural" look from planters and three lookout decks dotting a 250-m stretch of Sungei Whampoa.
In this latest PUB Active, Beautiful, Clean (ABC) Waters project, $2.2 million was spent on replacing upper parts of the concrete canal wall with natural rocks to courage plants to grow.
The canal now looks like a natural stream.
Environment and Water Resources Minister Yaacob Ibrahim, who officiated at the launch of the project yesterday, said: "So, now when we look out from our windows, the landscaping is beautiful - very different from the hard concrete that it used to be."
Another special feature of the project is rain gardens - pockets of depression with vegetation - that help filter and slow down the pace of run-off from paved areas and car parks from entering the drains.
Plants in the rain garden act to filter sediment in the run-off, improving the quality of water entering Sungei Whampoa.
Said Dr Yaacob: "Our water bodies do ot just store water or drain water - they have become places for family and community bonding."
St George's Lane resident Shanti Raja, 42, agreed: "These improvements are not only beautiful, but also good for the environment. Whenever I look at the surroundings, it makes me happy."
In the meantime, schools in the area like Hong Wen School will use the rain gardens as part of their outdoor learning while students from Bendemeer Secondary School's science and environment club will patrol this stretch of the river weekly.
Bendemeer's principal Goh Mee Mee added the school plans to launch a science-related project with PUB but details are being worked out.
The ABC Waters programme launched in 2006 has seen 13 projects completed to date, more recently, at Lower Seletar and Pandan reservoirs.
Projects due for completion this year include the second phase of the MacRitchie Reservoir makeover, Alexandra Canal and the Kallang River at Bishan Park. ESTHER NG
St George's Lane canal gets a makeover
Poon Chian Hui Straits Times 31 Jan 11;
WHENEVER Madam Hajijah Mohd, 62, peered out of the windows of her flat, she would be greeted with the unsightly view of a longkang, or drain canal.
Not anymore.
That area along St George's Lane at Sungei Whampoa has now been transformed into a garden full of shrubs and flowers.
'It is very beautiful; there is a very nice atmosphere here now,' said Madam Hajijah, who works part-time at a kindergarten. The mother of two has lived in the neighbourhood all her life.
Residents like her are set to enjoy the new community area centred on a humble - but beautified - canal.
The facelift of a 250m-long stretch of waterway from the Central Expressway to St George's Lane took 16 months - from June 2009 to September last year - and $2.2 million to complete.
It is part of national water agency PUB's Active, Beautiful, Clean (ABC) Waters programme, which aims to transform Singapore's reservoirs and waterways into clean and beautiful streams, rivers and lakes.
The St George's Lane project boasts features such as gabions and two 'rain gardens'.
Gabions are wire cages filled with rocks that line the sides of the canal. This allows creeper plants to grow and cover the grey concrete walls of the canal.
Rain gardens are areas beside the canal planted with five selected plants. These plants filter and purify rainwater absorbed into the soil. As a result, the water that enters the canal is cleaner.
Rainwater that flows from nearby carparks and built-up areas will also get channelled into the rain gardens.
Speaking at the official opening ceremony yesterday, Environment and Water Resources Minister Yaacob Ibrahim urged the community to 'take over and own the project'. The MP for Jalan Besar GRC and Minister-in-charge of Muslim Affairs was the guest of honour at the ceremony.
Grassroots leaders from Kolam Ayer St George West Residents' Committee and Whampoa McNair Residents' Committee are already looking into having morning exercises at the viewing deck and also patrolling the area to make sure it stays clean, he said.
Nearby schools are also offering their help to keep this new water feature in tip-top shape. Bendemeer Secondary School, for instance, will have students patrolling the area to pick up litter every week.
The ABC Waters programme, first launched in 2006, has already seen 13 projects completed so far. At least three more will be completed this year. They are the second phase of the MacRitchie Reservoir makeover, Alexandra Canal and Kallang River at Bishan Park.
Over 20 projects will be completed by next year under the first phase of the programme.
Qiuyi Tan Channel NewsAsia 30 Jan 11;
SINGAPORE: Cycling between Lakeside MRT station and Taman Jurong Town hub is now easier and safer, with a new dedicated cycling path.
The 1.4-kilometre path was completed and unveiled on Sunday morning by Finance Minister Tharman Shanmugaratnam.
From Lakeside train station, the path runs parallel to Yuan Ching Road, along Jurong Lake Park and on to Taman Jurong Town hub.
This is the first completed stretch of the Taman Jurong cycling paths.
One resident said she welcomed the new cycling path, adding that she felt assured as her husband would frequently cycle to work.
Another added: "(The path) is quite cooling, and I don't need to cycle along the main road (anymore)".
When fully completed in 2012, Taman Jurong will have some 10-kilometres of cycling track connecting cyclists to the town hub, Lakeside and the Jurong Lake area.
Taman Jurong is one of seven HDB towns under the National Cycling Plan, which a $43 million plan to build cycling paths that will connect key amenities in residential towns.
-CNA/wk
Ruben Sario The Star 31 Jan 11;
KOTA KINABALU: A sequence of 12 photographs showing a clouded leopard and her cub moving about in the lower Kinabatangan region in Sabah has strengthened calls among conservationists for the setting up of more wildlife forest corridors.
The photographs were captured last November by camera traps that were part of the Kinabatangan Carnivore Programme involving the Sabah Wildlife Department, conservation group Danau Girang Field Centre, French non-governmental organisation Hutan (that conducts conservation projects and research on orang utan) and WildCRU (the Wildlife Conservation Research Unit, which is part of the University of Oxford Department of Zoology).
Sabah Wildlife director Laurentius Ambu said pictures of the clouded leopard and its cub were captured in a narrow forest corridor between the Kinabatangan river and an oil palm plantation.
Hutan co-director Dr Marc Ancrenaz said the photographs showed that carnivores were still present in the Kinabatangan floodplain.
“The pictures show that these animals rely on forest corridors for moving around forest patches.
“As already shown for other species such as orang utan, gibbons, proboscis monkeys and elephants, these animals need corridors of forest for surviving in the Kinabatangan area.
“Without these corridors, species population will decline and become extinct.
“It is urgent for everybody to collaborate in order to create more corridors,” Dr Ancrenaz said.
Funding for the programme was started by American zoos in Houston, Columbus, Cincinnatti and Phoenix, as well as private donors from New York.
Isabelle Lai The Star 31 Jan 11;
PETALING JAYA: WWF Malaysia is taking the religious route in its tiger conservation programme.
For starters, it has met several local imam in Gerik, Perak, to help them draft Friday sermons to address the issue because it found that most poachers and traders were Malays.
It also plans to have a campaign targeting consumers, who are mostly Chinese who value tiger parts for food and traditional medicine.
WWF Malaysia senior communications officer Sara Sukor said the first Friday sermon on tiger conservation was read out in Gerik last year.
Sara said a survey done in Terengganu in 2008, after a similar sermon was made on turtle conservation and egg consumption, showed encouraging results in that many had changed perceptions about the issue.
“It is an Islamic way of life not to abuse animals.
“Setting up snares to capture these animals constitutes animal abuse,” she said.
She added, however, many did not think that poaching and illegal wildlife trade had anything to do with Islamic teachings.
She said many seizures of wildlife parts had been made along the Gerik-Jeli highway, near the Thai border, since 2008.
“Poaching is a very serious issue in Gerik as the Belum-Temengor forest complex is located in Perak and is home to a huge variety of wildlife species,” she said.
Sara said last year, which was the Year of the Tiger in the Chinese lunar calendar, was a good year for tiger conservation efforts with increased public awareness and concerns.
She lauded the Government for passing the Wildlife Conservation Act, which came into effect last December.
She also said that there had been many wildlife-related cases that were brought to public attention, including the high-profile Anson Wong case.
“The increased public awareness will help our ongoing efforts this year as we continue with our outreach programmes with Mycat,” she said, referring to the Malaysian Conservation Alliance for Tigers involving WWF Malaysia, the Malaysian Nature Society, Traffic South-East Asia and the Wildlife Conservation Society.
Malaysia was one of the 13 tiger-range countries that took part in the Tiger Summit last year and signed a declaration to double the number of tigers in their respective countries by 2022.
No 'padi angin' means more rice
2011/01/31
By Roy See Wei Zhi New Straits Times 31 Jan 11;
SERDANG: The red menace that has plagued the padi industry for more than 20 years, resulting in almost RM100 million in losses per planting season, will cease to be a problem with innovative technology.
A padi lookalike, the weedy rice (padi angin) has had a stranglehold on cultivated varieties by growing alongside them and competing for nutrients and space.
But no more. The Clearfield Production System (CPS) will see the cultivation of two special varieties of padi called MR220-CL1 and MR220-CL2.
These new varieties are tolerant to a potent herbicide called imidazolinone that will not allow the weedy rice to even sprout.
This effectively eradicates the padi angin which has no commercial value and has been a scourge to farmers in the peninsula for more than two decades.
Malaysian Agricultural Research and Development Institute (Mardi) principal research officer Dr Azmi Man said previously, there had been no truly effective way of controlling these noxious weeds.
"The old ways of fighting these weeds are either too costly or labour- intensive.
"It also has secondary effects that are detrimental to the main crop.
"Now, with the CPS, farmers finally have a cheap and easy solution to deal with the weedy rice that does not damage the cultivated padi."
Field trials have shown that the new varieties of padi produce up to 20 per cent more yield than standard padi because the improved method eliminates weedy rice from competing for nutrients.
The new padi also has a shorter maturation period of 105 and 100 days, respectively, compared with the 110 days for unaltered MR220.
With the CPS, since the new padi can be grown and harvested faster, Azmi believed the national average for padi yields can be increased from 4.4 tonnes to 6.5 tonnes per hectare.
This means that for every RM1 a farmer invests, he would get RM2.50 in returns, said Azmi.
"This will bring our country one step closer to being self-sufficient in terms of rice production. It also relieves the stress of food-shortage problems."
A study conducted in 2004 showed that more than RM90 million was lost per season because padi cannot be harvested due to weedy rice infestation.
Azmi said he had seen whole padi fields go to waste because they could not be harvested as the weedy rice had taken over completely.
CPS is the product of a joint-venture project which started in 2003, between Mardi and BASF Sdn Bhd.
It is a padi-growing method that combines the use of genetically-cultured padi, together with a purpose-designed herbicide from BASF.
BASF crop protection division senior manager T. George Varghese said because BASF was in charge of distribution, they would be selling both the padi seeds and herbicide as an easy-to-use package.
"We will run training sessions and hold demonstrations for farmers to learn how to use the CPS."
Michael Richardson, for the Straits Times 31 Jan 11;
IS ASIA on the edge of another food supply crisis that will stoke inflation, protection and political unrest?
Some recent developments suggest that it is. Many Asian countries, including China, India and Indonesia, are battling to curb soaring food prices.
Bad weather, rising affluence, increasing demand for grain-intensive meat and under-investment in agriculture have contributed to the rises. Low interest rates may also play a part, as investors use cheap money to trade in farm and energy commodities, driving prices higher.
If unchecked, this could hit consumer spending in Asia, which is leading the revival of the global economy. France, as chair of the Group of 20 leading economies this year, considers it a priority to have a collective response to 'excessive volatility' in food and energy prices.
Rising food costs have raised fears of a repeat of the global spiral in 2007 and 2008, when prices of rice and wheat, Asia's largest staple food items, rose sharply. Rice prices trebled in the six months to May 2008, prompting some exporting countries to restrict overseas sales to ensure there was enough for home consumption.
Rice is a key political barometer in the developing world, where it is the staple of more than three billion people, or over half the planet's population. About 90 per cent of rice is grown in Asia. When rice prices trebled in 2008, the World Bank estimated that an additional 100 million people were pushed into poverty.
Populous Bangladesh and Indonesia are importing substantial amounts of rice to build their stockpiles. Indonesia surprised the market last week by buying 820,000 tonnes of rice from Thailand, four times the volume initially sought, as it raced to complete a total order of 1.5 million tonnes by the end of next month.
The situation prompted the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation to issue a call to governments last Wednesday not to repeat past mistakes by taking action that could aggravate the problem, such as export restrictions.
Mr Richard China, director of the FAO's policy and programme development support division, added that the agency strongly advised against such measures, which 'provoke more uncertainty and disruption on world markets and drive prices up further globally, while depressing prices domestically and hence curtailing incentives to produce more food'.
However, the supply outlook for rice and wheat in Asia today appears to be significantly better than it was before the last food crisis, at least in the short term.
Thailand, the world's biggest rice exporter, has pledged to maintain this year's exports at 9 to 9.5 million tonnes, after shipping 9 million tonnes in 2009.
The Philippines, the world's biggest buyer of rice last year, said it would cut its imports this year by at least half, compared with record purchases last year.
Rice production and national buffer stocks in Asia are higher than those three years ago. The FAO forecast recently that the region's rice harvest last year would reach a record level of 627 million tonnes, 2.1 per cent more than in 2009. The improvement was mainly due to better harvests in India and the Philippines.
Early FAO projections for this year's wheat harvest in Asia pointed to a crop similar to last year's level of 224 million tonnes. This, too, was a record although prolonged drought in China's grain belt may reduce Asian wheat output.
Moreover, the rate of production increase for both rice and wheat lags behind population growth. As a result, prices are higher than they would otherwise be.
Averaging US$330 (S$425) per tonne in the first half of this month, the benchmark United States wheat price was about 50 per cent above its level a year earlier, although still 31 per cent below its record high in March 2008.
The International Rice Research Institute, based in the Philippines, says rice prices need to be brought down to about US$300 per tonne, a level that would allow Asia's 200 million rice farms to make some profit, yet would keep the grain affordable for poor rice consumers. To achieve this target, an additional 8 to 10 million tonnes of rice must be produced every year for the next 20 years.
This big challenge can be met in two ways: by expanding output in existing rice-producing countries and by enlarging the small circle of net rice exporters.
Expanding local production would involve improving yields, building irrigation schemes to convert rice land depending on rain to produce just a single crop each year into double- or treble-cropping rice systems, and converting land to rice production that is currently used for other agricultural activities.
At present, just four Asian countries - Thailand, Vietnam, India and Pakistan - account for about 70 per cent of the world's rice exports. The US provides another 12 per cent.
In Asia, only Cambodia and Myanmar appear to have enough suitable land to become surplus rice producers. Outside Asia, the main potential for extra rice production is in South America and Africa.
However expanded rice output is achieved, it will make a vital contribution to food security in Asia.
The writer is a visiting senior research fellow at the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies.
Posts
visitors since Nov 07