Best of our wild blogs: 1 Jan 11

2011 is International Year of Forests!
from Celebrating Singapore's BioDiversity!

What's so marine about 2011 International Year of Forests?
from wild shores of singapore

Bitten by a Walking Trash Collector
from Macro Photography in Singapore and Why do Spiders Decorate their Webs?

Virgin trip to Mandai Mangroves
from Urban Forest

101231 Venus Drive
from Singapore Nature

Good bye Mandai Orchid Gardens. Farewell to our feathered friends
from Life's Indulgence

Good Bye Mandai Orchid Garden
from Beauty of Fauna and Flora in Nature

Summary of Odonata Collection in 2010!
from Nature Photography - Singapore Odonata

Bad experience when photographing the Hooded Pitta
from Biodiversity Singapore

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Consider animal-less options for research

Straits Times Forum 1 Jan 10;

I AGREE with the views expressed by the Society for Prevention of Cruelty to Animals ("SPCA voices concern over animal welfare, experimentation"; Thursday) and the Animal Concerns Research and Education Society or Acres ("Animals in research: Room for greater transparency"; Dec 24).

In this day and age of great technological advances, why do we still need to use animals for experiments in the name of scientific advances? As Acres pointed out, there are other options and I hope the authorities will seriously consider them.

I also join the SPCA in urging Resorts World Sentosa to be a socially responsible corporation and reconsider its decision to proceed with the importation of wild dolphins. We should not be so selfish as to enjoy at the expense of another sentient being's suffering.

Jill Hum (Ms)

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Wildlife trade: Small efforts can make a big difference

Straits Times 1 Jan 11;

SUN bear cubs, slow lorises and sacks of orchids were just some of the items up for sale when Mr Jacob Phelps visited Thailand's border markets during his field research last year. The National University of Singapore (NUS) graduate student plans to go back and fully document the orchid trade there as part of his doctoral thesis.

More than 2,000 species are traded in this region, he said. But endangered orchids can be hard to tell apart from common ones if they are not flowering, so Cites member countries voted to protect all orchids.

'In fact, we don't know much about how sensitive orchids are to harvest because we know so little about their biology,' he said.

'Each species would respond differently, but we need to take a precautionary approach - if we don't know how they respond to harvest, then we need to be careful and begin to collect data.'

Mr Phelps also commented on what Singapore can do to better monitor and tighten controls on wildlife trade.

'Not only does Singapore represent a market for wildlife products like shark's fin, animal skins, pets, sea horses and animal parts for traditional Chinese medicine; it is a hub of transport, with live wildlife and wildlife products re-exported via Singapore,' he said. For example, Singapore is a major legal exporter of farmed orchids and ornamental fish.

Currently, the Agri-Food and Veterinary Authority (AVA) is Singapore's sole Cites authority and has both bureaucratic and independent advisory functions.

That is a potential conflict of interest, Mr Phelps pointed out, and Cites should require some sort of independent review of countries' trade decisions. Currently, there is no requirement that a country's Cites management and scientific authorities be separate.

Mr Phelps and his fellow researchers would like to see local universities and research institutes more involved in Cites work here.

In response, the AVA said it does consult the National Parks Board, the Raffles Museum of Biodiversity Research at NUS, and the South-east Asian Fisheries Development Centre for scientific advice, and seeks enforcement help from agencies like the Immigration & Checkpoints Authority and the Police Coast Guard.

Mr Phelps suggested the Singapore authorities should also do more spot Customs checks, train Customs officials to properly identify restricted wildlife, and use DNA techniques to correctly identify traded species.

'Wildlife trade is hugely lucrative and there are significant incentives for traders to bypass regulations. We need to invest resources and effort to catch infractions if we want to protect animals and plants from illegal trade,' he said.

GRACE CHUA

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Good food? It's grown just around the corner

Tan Hui Yee Straits Times 1 Jan 11;

MENTION 'community garden' and one thinks of retirees harvesting caterpillar-nibbled vegetables from plots the size of bathtubs or row upon row of frangipani and roses that are nice to look at but not to eat.

There are about 400 community gardens scattered around Singapore, mostly amateur efforts in residential neighbourhoods and schools that do not promise much in the way of economic returns.

But Mr Allan Lim, 38, chief executive of Alpha Biofuels, and fourth-generation farmer Kenny Eng, 37, from Nyee Phoe Group, are about to change that.

They have devised a plan to raise interest in community farming in an environmentally sustainable way and have even roped in coffee company Starbucks and downtown microbrewery Brewerkz.

The finer details are still being worked out, but this is how it will unfold once launched later this year:

Instead of throwing away used coffee grounds and hops, Starbucks and Brewerkz will give some to selected community gardens for use as compost ingredients.

Community gardeners, who will be trained to make compost from a nutrient-rich mixture of hops, coffee grounds and horticultural waste, will then sell the organic produce from their land back to Starbucks and Brewerkz and share the profits as a cooperative.

If all goes well, the two food and beverage chains will even tailor a part of their menu according to the fruit, vegetables or herbs produced by the community gardens.

Starbucks, which throws away several tonnes of coffee grounds every month from its 67 outlets islandwide, hopes to redirect up to 40 per cent of its waste to the project, says its Singapore managing director Jeff Miller.

It already runs the 'Grounds for your garden' scheme where customers can ask an outlet to save used grounds which they can then take home for free to use as compost.

Mr Lim hopes each community garden - which is expected to use 1.2 tonnes of coffee grounds or hops each year - will eventually be paired with a nearby Starbucks or Brewerkz outlet. Patrons at the Starbucks outlet in Thomson Plaza, for example, may find themselves nibbling on a gingerbread cookie made with ginger from a Thomson-area garden.

The vision is to create a small-scale, Singaporean version of the global 'locavore' movement, where environmentally conscious consumers try to eat food produced nearby to cut down their carbon footprint.

At the same time, it could help younger Singaporeans, growing up in an urban setting, develop a closer relationship with the environment their food is grown in, says Mr Eng. This is especially crucial because land-scarce Singapore imports most of what it eats.

Finally, it could raise the profile of community farming. Mr Lim says: 'When the public think about community farming, they think of it as a pastime. They don't see it as economically viable. And, most of the time, they don't grow fantastic stuff.'

Mr Fred Chong, chairman of Goldhill Gardening Club, which runs an award-winning community garden off Dunearn Road, concedes as much.

The semi-retiree, who is in his 60s, says: 'We once asked a farmer to come and grade our produce. He gave us 10 marks out of 100. The vegetables looked like rejects to him; he said he couldn't sell them on the market.

'But he gave us full marks for our enthusiasm about our koyak vegetables full of holes,' he adds, using the Malay word for 'spoilt'.

Under this scheme, the community gardeners will be encouraged not to turn to intensive monoculture farming, where only one type of crop is grown, says Mr Lim.

'They can plant three fig trees, one starfruit tree, one mango tree; it can look well designed and pleasing to the eye.'

The gardeners also need not worry about having to fulfil any production quota.

Mr Eng says: 'Size doesn't matter. It's the spirit of getting the right people to do the right thing.

'If even two bunches of bananas from these plots can be made into 10 muffins, then we would have succeeded.'

For now, both men are busy putting together various parts of the plan.

Mr Lim's company is researching the best conditions for the coffee and hop compost, which will then be tested on a pilot community garden.

They then plan to invite community gardeners for networking and information-sharing sessions. Various community development councils will help pick good gardens for the first phase of this project.

Asked who will fund the project, both men laugh nervously. Mr Lim reveals his company has already ploughed more than $6,000 into the venture while Mr Eng implores: 'We hope to convince more corporations to join us.'

They remain hopeful that more companies - big and small, from cafes to curry-puff makers - will see value in this local food venture.

Mr Lim says: 'Who's to say Old Chang Kee won't use local potatoes?'

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Rare monk seal colony found in the Mediterranean

Victoria Gill BBC News 31 Dec 10;

Scientists have found a colony of rare Mediterranean monk seals at an undisclosed location in Greece.

The species is the world's most endangered seal, and one of the most endangered marine mammals - fewer than 600 individuals remain.

Researchers are keeping the location of the colony secret to avoid having the seals disturbed by human visitors.

It is the only place in the region where seals lie on open beaches, rather than hide in coastal caves.

Alexandros Karamanlidis, scientific co-ordinator of the Mom/Hellenic Society for the Study and Protection of the Monk seal, explained that this was the seals' "original behaviour".

"It is human disturbance that has caused the species to retreat to inaccessible caves," he told BBC News.

"So this place is incredibly important - the seals feel so secure that they go out on to open beaches."

The Mom researchers, whose society name is derived from the Latin name of the species, Monachus monachus, have been monitoring and studying monk seals for more than 20 years.

This has not been an easy task when most of the animals now live in areas that are not visible from the water line.

By driving the seals into secluded caves, the scientists say, human activity has also affected the number of seal pups that survive into adulthood.

Dr Karamanlidis explained: "Because of human disturbance, [the seals] give birth in these coastal caves, [meaning that] more pups die during storms."

The number of seal pups born annually in the newly discovered colony on this tiny island is amongst the highest recorded anywhere in the Mediterranean Sea.

The team has placed cameras on the island to study the seals remotely.

The area's popularity with tourists has gradually driven the animals away from other beaches, and the scientists hope to stop the same thing happening on this island.

"It's a small island in the Aegean with nice sandy beaches," Dr Karamanlidis told BBC News.

"So if it remains open to people, the place will get crowded and the seals will start going away again."

More than half of the world's remaining monk seals live in Greece.

The society is now appealing to the Greek government to make the part of the island where the seals live, and its inshore waters, a marine protected area.

"The seals only survive in Greece because we have these isolated islands that people do not have access to," said Dr Karamanlidis.

"So we're trying to make this a place where the seals feel secure."

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Coral bleaching sighted in Gujarat, probe begins

Daily News and Analysis 1 Jan 11;

More sad news for environment lovers — after the revelation of 44% of Gujarat coast eroding, the Wildlife Trust of India (WTI) is now suspecting coral bleaching along the state's coastline.

Coral bleaching — a process which causes coral to lose its colour and eventually die — can be of great concern in terms of survival of the ecosystem. The state forest department and WTI have kicked off investigations to understand its nature and causes as well as effects on the coral biodiversity.

According to officials coral bleaching is whitening of corals as a result of death or expulsion of algal microorganisms called zooxanthellae that live in a crucial symbiotic relationship with corals.

It occurs when coral loses its colour because of the stress the animal experiences. When it occurs, it serves as an indication of several things happening in the ecosystem.

"The coral reef ecosystems found in tropical seas are calcium carbonate exoskeleton of massive colonies of individual coral polyps which measure about a few millimetres in diameter. The polyps are dependent on photosynthetic unicellular algae - the zooxanthellae, for nutrition, which also give the corals their colour. Under stress (changes in water temperature, radiation levels, salinity, sedimentation etc) polyps may expel these organisms, resulting in bleaching," said RD Kamboj, Director, Marine National Park, Jamnagar.

Coral bleaching was reported from Mithapur Reef and Gulf of Kutch Marine National Park, earlier this year. The sightings of bleaching as well as the ensuing investigations are a part of the WTI's Coral Reef Securement Project which assists the state forest department in conservation of corals.

"Bleaching of corals up to a certain extent is fairly common, reversible natural phenomenon and not necessarily alarming. The problem is when the degree is higher than the critical reversible limit which can result in large scale death of colonies," said Dr Rahul Kaul, Chief Ecologist, WTI.

"We are now monitoring the bleaching and recording the recovery rate. Preliminary signs are positive, as we have seen some signs of recovery in Mithapur. Also, new recruits have been observed which means that the corals are propagating," he further stated.

"As long as bleaching is seen, it is a sign that corals are not dead. However, bleaching can end either way… recovery or death, and monitoring it will help provide more insight on the situation," said Alasdair Edwards, Emeritus Professor of Coral Reef Ecology, University of Newcastle, United Kingdom.

Forest department, wildlife trust probe bleaching of corals
R D Kamboj India Express 3 Jan 11;

The state Forest Department and Wildlife Trust of India (WTI) have initiated a probe into the bleaching of corals along the Gujarat coastline. Bleaching is characterised by the whitening of corals and results in the death or expulsion of algal micro-organisms called zooxanthellae that live in a symbiotic relationship with the corals.

The probe aims to find the nature, cause and the degree of bleaching as it can lead to large scale death of coral colonies.

R D Kamboj, Director, Marine National Park, Jamnagar, said: “The coral reef ecosystems found in tropical seas are calcium carbonate exoskeleton of massive colonies of individual coral polyps which measure about a few millimetres in diameter. The polyps are dependent on photosynthetic unicellular algae — zooxanthellae for nutrition, which also give the corals their colour. Under stress (changes in water temperature, radiation levels, salinity, and sedimentation), the polyps may expel these organisms, resulting in bleaching.”

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Pakistan floods, fighting destroy wildlife

Sajjad Tarakzai Yahoo News 31 Dec 10;

KUND, Pakistan (AFP) – Disaster struck out of nowhere. The flash floods were so sudden that wardens at one of Pakistan's most famed parks could do nothing to save their animals.

Leopards, deer and bears all drowned as the murky waters quickly engulfed them.

Kund park, a tourist spot located where the Kabul and Indus rivers meet 100 kilometres (60 miles) northwest of Islamabad, lost all its wildlife including 100 endangered species in this year's flood crisis.

It was the worst single natural destruction of wildlife in Pakistan, where experts say the floods, military offensives against the Taliban and spreading militancy threaten natural habitats and species, some of them already endangered.

"Floods destroyed everything. It killed all the animals and species in this park. It was a great loss to wildlife," said Mumtaz Malik, formerly the top wildlife official in northwest Pakistan.

"None of them were rescued. Nobody expected such a catastrophe."

Among the dead were two leopards, 70 deer and 24 bears, said Ayan-ud-din, one of the caretakers at Kund.

Peacocks, ducks and pheasants were also lost.

All the animals drowned while locked in cages and enclosures. The bears had been rescued from human cruelty, only to die in Pakistan's worst natural disaster after monsoon rains swept north to south in July and August.

"When we came back, only two bears were alive. They were shifted to another bear centre in Punjab," Inayat ur Rehman, manager of the bear centre, told AFP.

The floods had crippled the park's perimeter and destroyed the bear centre.

The sanctuary started out as a research station in 2000 to provide veterinary care and shelter to 27 bears formerly used for baiting.

Fifty turtles kept for research purposes were also washed away and killed.

The state of wildlife receives little attention in Pakistan, the front line state in America's war on Al-Qaeda and the Taliban. US drone attacks target militant commanders in the mountains of Pakistan's northwestern tribal belt.

Pakistan's army and air force have battled homegrown Taliban foot soldiers for years, but militant groups have carved out sanctuaries in the mountains and valleys -- all of which is affecting wildlife, experts say.

"Bombing and shelling in Afghanistan and in the Pakistani tribal areas have disturbed the resident wildlife," said Malik.

Authorities say they have no access and are unable to enforce wildlife protection law in the semi-autonomous tribal belt, so instead they piece together details from local tribesmen and hunters.

According to conservative estimates, from 500,000 to a million birds migrate through Pakistan each year, flying south from Siberia to pass the winter in central and south Asia.

Birds search for natural habitats along the Indus and the Kabul, the two major flyways of waterfowl and other waterbirds migrating through Pakistan in November and December from breeding grounds in Siberia and Central Asia.

There are no precise statistics, but experts chart a steady decline, blamed in part on fighting, but also on the more typical enemies of wildlife the world over -- hunting, deforestation, urbanisation, global warming and pollution.

"These situations have forced birds to change the routes that they have been using for generations," said Asad Lodhi, deputy wildlife conservationist in the northwestern province of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

"Unrest is definitely a cause. Arms and ammunition bring destruction and these birds are so sensitive that they change their routes," Lodhi said.

Fakhar-i-Abbas, head of the Bioresource Research Centre in Islamabad, says that out of 650 bird species in Pakistan, about 275 are winter visitors.

"Complaints about a reduction in the number of these visitors started early in the first decade of this century," he told AFP, listing drought, flooding, fighting and pollution as possible causes.

But the lack of accurate statistics means that the reasons cannot be confirmed, he warned.

Hundreds of hunters prey on waterfowl during the hunting season from December to March, and kill a large number of birds, experts say.

The most notorious hunters in Pakistan are sheikhs and princes who flock to Pakistan each year to hunt the houbara bustard bird with falcons, arriving by private charter jet from the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia and Kuwait.

Their wildly extravagant parties are allotted private hunting grounds in Sindh, Baluchistan and Punjab provinces by the Pakistani government, which is scheduled to receive 222 million dollars in aid this financial year from Saudi Arabia.

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Best of our wild blogs: 31 Dec 10

Otter at Semakau!
from sgbeachbum

How to identify civet poop?
from The Diet of the Common Palm Civet in Singapore

Goodbye Mandai Orchid Garden
from My Itchy Fingers

2010: A Natural Odyssey
from Trek through Paradise

Back to MacRitchie
from Urban Forest

Homage to the hainesii
from wild shores of singapore

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Mandai Orchid Garden to move to Kranji

Seet Sok Hwee / Monica Kotwani Channel NewsAsia 30 Dec 10;

SINGAPORE: Come new year, Mandai Orchid Garden as we know it will be no more. Friday is the last day at its current location, before it moves to Kranji by the middle of next year.

The 60-year old garden is one of the oldest in South East Asia. Its owner, Heah Hock Heng said it has some 50,000 orchid plants comprising over 100 varieties.

The Garden's lease expires on Friday and it is moving to make way for the expansion of the Singapore Zoo and Night Safari.

And due to land space constraints at the new place, Mandai Gardens has sold some of its plants to the Shangri-La Group and Singapore Botanical Gardens. It has also offered some orchid plants for sale to the Singapore Island Country Club.

Mr Heah said some exciting ideas are in the works for the new place, but until then, talks are in progress with the new landlord.

-CNA/ac

Mandai Orchid Garden to move to Kranji
New smaller site will house only 5,000 of its 50,000-strong collection
Jamie Ee Wen Wei Straits Times 1 Jan 11;

MANDAI Orchid Garden, the oldest orchid garden here, will move from its current site to Kranji, as time runs out on its lease today.

The 4ha garden has about 50,000 orchids, including more than 100 varieties that date back more than 40 years.

However, the move will not be as big as the size of the collection indicates: This is because the new site for the garden - all 0.8 ha of it - will be able to house only 5,000 of the orchids, a 10th of the collection.

Mr Heah Hock Heng, the chairman of Mandai Orchid Garden, said he has been working with organisations and individuals who wish to take some of the plants. So far, the Shangri-La Group has bought more than 1,000 and the National Parks Board has bought 600.

Mr Heah, 75, said: 'Unfortunately, if there are no takers, I may have to throw some of them away.'

Some of the orchids in the collection are named after famous people such as former British prime minister Margaret Thatcher, former OCBC Bank chairman Tan Chin Tuan, and Singapore's first chief minister David Marshall.

The garden's current Mandai plot will be developed into a 35ha tourist attraction, which will become the fourth in the area alongside the Singapore Zoo, Night Safari and the upcoming River Safari.

Mr Heah began his fight to preserve the garden in March last year. In November, the Singapore Land Authority offered him a one-year tenancy, until the end of this year, but he rejected it.

He said: 'They piled a huge rent increase on me - from $2,000 to $20,000 a month, among other conditions. It was just impossible for me to continue.'

In November, he began hunting for a new site and found the 0.8ha one in Kranji. He has six months to move there.

He said the new place will continue to receive visitors, just like the Mandai one did, welcoming up to 1,000 tourists a month who each paid a $3.50 entry fee. Entry to the new place is free.

The Mandai Orchid Garden was started in 1951 by the late Mr John Laycock, a lawyer and founder of the Malayan Orchid Society, now known as the Orchid Society of South-east Asia.

When he died in 1960, his daughter, Mrs Amy Ede, and her husband John took over the business. They became known for their books and love of orchids and gardening until he died in 2003 and she died in 2007.

Since Mr Heah took over ownership of the garden in 2001, he has added two full-scale laboratories.

One is used for cross-breeding orchids and the other is used for manufacturing fertiliser.

'I have to demolish what I've built over the years. It's not a happy situation,' he said.

The gardens' tenants, such as a research firm, an education centre and the restaurant Vanilla Pod, will move out from today.

The curator, Mr Hedrick Kwan, 33, is upset about the move. As a member of a group that tried to save the garden, he went as far as to meet the Singapore Tourism Board to offer ideas on possible uses for it.

Mr Kwan, who left his job in November, said: 'To be honest, I'm just tired now. We fought so hard, but in the end, this is the result.

'We've made enough noise but when we knew the outcome, we thought the next best thing was to think about how to save the plants.'

The online version was edited by Channel NewsAsia to this...

Mandai Orchid Garden to move to Kranji
Seet Sok Hwee / Monica Kotwani Channel NewsAsia 30 Dec 10;

SINGAPORE: Come new year, Mandai Orchid Garden as we know it will be no more. Friday is the last day at its current location, before it moves to Kranji by the middle of next year.

The 60-year old garden is one of the oldest in South East Asia. Its owner, Heah Hock Heng said it has some 50,000 orchid plants comprising over 100 varieties.

The Garden's lease expires on Friday and it is moving as part of the Government's plans to develop the Mandai Nature Cluster and to complement existing attractions within that area.

And due to land space constraints at the new place, Mandai Gardens has sold some of its plants to the Shangri-La Group and Singapore Botanical Gardens. It has also offered some orchid plants for sale to the Singapore Island Country Club.

Mr Heah said some exciting ideas are in the works for the new place, but until then, talks are in progress with the new landlord.

-CNA/ac/fa

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Singapore green firms, out in the cold, wait for spring

Some face a tough financial climate but hope for better times after a 'transition'
Joyce Hooi Business Times 31 Dec 10;

(SINGAPORE) Some firms are bursting with promise while the future of others is fraught with uncertainty as the green sector treads gingerly beyond 2010.

For several companies this year, it has been a case of pain before gain. The trek to promising times has been riddled with bottom lines sinking ever further into the red.

Solar thin-film company Anwell Technologies Ltd, for example, almost tripled its losses for the nine months ended Sept 30, from HK$108.6 million to HK$319.6 million (S$53.2 million).

Its original business - the manufacturing of optical discs like DVDs - put the squeeze on gross margins with rising raw material costs and falling selling prices.

Chief financial officer Ken Wu prefers to think of this whole year as a 'transition period for the company', as it sidles more and more into the sexier territory of solar energy, while its optical disc business provides a baseline of steady, if unexciting, income.

With mass production of solar thin-film starting in March and income from the solar segment being produced in earnest from Q4 this year, the tide of losses might soon be stemmed. Mr Wu expects the solar business to represent more than 50 per cent of the firm's revenue by 2012.

Another green firm that is putting up with some red ink in anticipation of fatter times is EcoWise Holdings.

The firm, which had pinned its hopes on converting coal-fired power plants in China into biomass co-generation plants, has seen its Wuhan project become the albatross around the neck of its earnings.

Even as Q3 revenue increased 39.1 per cent to $19.37 million (thanks to the acquisition of a Malaysian tyre-retreading firm), its net losses more than doubled year-on-year to $428,000 partially because of implementation costs at the Wuhan plant, in which it had a 49 per cent stake.

EcoWise is, for its part, trying to plug the costs coming out of Wuhan. 'We are taking action and seeing improvements,' Low Kian Beng, EcoWise's deputy chief executive officer told BT. In January 2010, the operation of the coal-fired power plant was ceased to halt operational losses.

Its great green hope for 2011, however, has shifted closer to home, with revenue coming from the Malaysian side.

What EcoWise is particularly excited about is the biomass co-generation system in Marina South that it was contracted to design, build and operate for 15 years.

As with Anwell, shareholders will have to hang in there for the long haul, with revenue from the Marina South site expected to start rolling in from 2012.

While some green firms were done wandering in the wilderness, The Think Environmental Co (TTEC) appears to be changing its route to the Promised Land.

Just a little over a year ago, its name was Asia Tiger and it made office furniture. As of its latest results, its UK associate, Think Greenergy, had not started its waste-to-energy operations and its other UK associate, Think Environmental, is racking up huge losses in the waste processing business, DMG analysts noted in their report on the firm this month.

For the half-year ended Sept 30, the group waded in $1.87 million of red ink. In a more perplexing turn, the firm recently announced its foray into a second brand-new area in a span of about 12 months: gold mining in Mali.

'Given that the management has no proven record in offshore gold mining, and offshore gold exploration is filled with uncertainty, we view (TTEC's) choice of business diversification negatively,' said DMG analysts Tan Chee How and Terence Wong.

Its environmental segment, which the analysts deemed 'troubled', is unlikely to be the firm's saving grace next year. Think Greenergy is unlikely to start operations until the financial year of 2012 at the earliest, the DMG report said.

For its part, the firm maintains that its latest investment is 'opportunistic' and that there is 'no conflict in its commitment to being an environment-friendly company in this new area of gold exploration and production' due to its 'clean mining methods'.

Another firm - Sunpower Group - is making the transition into the green sector with decidedly less trauma.

It branched out from pipe supports more than a decade ago into heat pipe exchangers, waste gas and energy recovery systems. Its 35 million yuan (S$6.84 million) plant started production earlier this month without incident and its revenue and profit are up in healthy double-digit terms for the nine months ended Sept 30.

Executive director Frank Mah has an outlook for next year that is both sanguine and unequivocal.

He told BT: 'I have good feelings about 2011. I feel that Sunpower's position in the market is getting better and better. I can foresee that 2011 will be better than 2010.'

The big boys in Singapore who have set their sights on the green sector also expect better times ahead.

'We believe we will see more rapid development and investment of 'green' infrastructure around the world, and this will present opportunities for investors to benefit from this unique asset class,' said Thomas Pang, CEO of Keppel Infrastructure Fund Management, trustee-manager of K-Green Trust.

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Indonesia should build nuclear plant now

Antara 30 Dec 10;
Jakarta (ANTARA News) - Now is the time for Indonesia to build a nuclear power plant to overcome its electricity supply shortages and boost industrial development, an observer said.

"If Indonesia has no courage to make the great leap, it will always lag behind," intelligence observer Wawan H Purwanto said when presenting a year-end reflection here on Thursday.

He said neighboring Malaysia and Singapore were now preparing to build their nuclear plants.

It was even reported that Singapore would lease an island in Riau province and use it as the location of its nuclear power plant.

"I am afraid that we will become their consumer because we are not yet able to meet our domestic need for electricity," he said.

He said that there were many energy sources other then nuclear such as geothermal, wind and water that could be developed but these sources could not yield power massively.

Their production is less than 1,000 megawatt (mw), while a nuclear power plant could produce 10,000 mw, while in fact our need for electricity at home is only about 3,000 mw.

He said that the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) had recommended that Indonesia met the requirement for the development of nuke plant.

The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) is always ready to help countries including Indonesia build a nuclear power plant (PLTN), a spokesman said.

"Indonesia should not hesitate in its plan to develop PLTN because the world is working together to help the countries which are willing to build their nuclear power plants," consultant at IAEA nuclear technology development section in Austria, Jupiter S Pane said.

Pane said IAEA has formed a special team, called Integrated Nuclear Infrastructure Group (INIG) whose main task was to systematically help developing countries in their plan to build their nuclear power plants.(*)

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Malaysia, Sipadan: Dive permit quota to stay

Muguntan Vanar The Star 30 Dec 10;

KOTA KINABALU: Sabah will not increase its daily permits for diving at Sipadan island.

State Tourism, Culture and Environment Minister Datuk Masidi Manjun said the move to maintain a 120 daily dive permit quota is to ensure preservation of Sipadan’s environment.

He said Sipadan, which is part of the Semporna marine area, was only recently endorsed as the richest marine bio-diversity spot on Earth by a team of top scientists, remained a favourite tourist spot with a waiting list that stretches up to seven months.

“If we do not protect and conserve our environment, the tourism industry will not be able to thrive because the environment is the asset for the tourism industry,” he said, in reiterating he state is taking the necessary steps to preserve its natural heritage.

He said similar measures to preserve the environment was also taken for Mount Kinabalu where the number of climbers are limited to 192 a day.

“No matter how many visitors we have, we have to do something to prevent these flora and fauna from being affected,” he added.

He said the Sabah government would not be implementing any physical development at internationally renowned rainforest research center in the Danum Valley and also the bio-diversity rich Maliau Basin which is also known as the ‘Lost World’.

“Even the roads leading to Danum Valley which is not sealed, will not be repaired in order to slow down illegal hunters and poachers,” he said.

A recently-concluded 17-day Semporna Marine Ecological Expedition 2010 by a team scientists from Malaysia, United States and Holland discovered Semporna and its 49 islands had the highest marine bio-diversity in the world.

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