Saturday, 25 December 2010
Monday, 20 December 2010
Country with the highest GNH index
Wednesday, 10 November 2010
Quality of life gets better and better in Asia
Nov 6, 2010
Study puts 5 Asian nations among top 10 most improved ones
UNITED NATIONS: A United Nations report ranking countries according to their citizens' quality of life has found that Asia has made the biggest strides in recent decades.
Nations which have risen most in the rankings of the Human Development Index include 'growth miracles' such as China, which has climbed eight places in the last five years to 89th.
East Asia and the Pacific had the strongest performance of any region over the past 40 years - twice the average worldwide progress, according to the latest rankings.
The annual study, which compared 169 countries between 2005 and this year, placed five Asian nations in the top-10 list of countries showing the most improvement.
These were China (No. 2), Nepal (No. 3), Indonesia (No. 4), Laos (No. 6) and South Korea (No. 8).
The report aims to give a broader assessment of quality of life than just income - by including health, education, gender equality and political freedom - and lead writer Jeni Klugman said most of the world has seen 'dramatic progress' since 1970.
China, the second highest index achiever since 1970, has been successful mainly because of income rather than health or education, the report said. Its per capita income has increased 21-fold over four decades, lifting hundreds of millions out of poverty. Yet its school enrolment has dropped since 1970 and life expectancy has not improved as much as that in other nations.
India demonstrated more modest progress, increasing its ranking by one notch to 119th.
Singapore also improved its ranking by one place to 27th, which makes it the highest ranked South-east Asian country, ahead of Brunei (37th) and Malaysia (57th).
The report noted that Singapore has made progress since 2005. Life expectancy at birth has increased by one year to 80.7 years, average schooling years almost by one year to 8.8 and gross national income per capita by around 8per cent to US$48,893 (S$62,870).
On a global scale, average life expectancy rose from 59 to 70 years, primary school enrolment grew from 55 to 70per cent, and per capita incomes doubled to more than US$10,000. Poor nations have made particular progress.
Despite the 'growth surges' in the Asia-Pacific region, the report said it is becoming ever more difficult to break into the rich club of nations.
Norway - with its 81.0 years of life expectancy and average annual income of US$58,810 - has now topped the list for all but two years since 2001.
In stark contrast, Zimbabwe - which came bottom - has a life expectancy of just 47 years and per capita income of US$176.
'The divide between developed and developing countries persists: A small subset of countries has remained at the top of the world income distribution and only a handful of countries that started out poor have joined that high income group,' the report concluded.
AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE, ASSOCIATED PRESS
Moving up
The top 10 countries which showed the most improvement between 2005 and this year are:
1. Oman
2. China
3. Nepal
4. Indonesia
5. Saudi Arabia
6. Laos
7. Tunisia
8. South Korea
9. Algeria
10. Morocco
Sunday, 24 October 2010
All The Best to 5N1 and 5N2
Dear all,
Friday, 8 October 2010
Inserts for Revision Papers
Sunday, 26 September 2010
Rivers in Trouble
Yesterday was the sixth annual World Rivers Day, with events scheduled all around the world to clean up rivers and highlight threats to them. The Straits Times looks at the top 10 endangered rivers.
Monday, 13 September 2010
Target: Welfare
British minister's plan to revamp system running into fierce opposition
By Jonathan Eyal, Europe Correspondent
LONDON: Mr Iain Duncan Smith, the minister in charge of Britain's pensions and social security payments, is a man in a hurry.
Although he got his job only a few months ago, he has already threatened to resign twice, angered by opposition from colleagues to plans for a radical overhaul of Britain's welfare system.
Mr Duncan Smith appears to have won this skirmish: His reform proposals will be unveiled next month, and they will affect all British government handouts, from allowances to the disabled to child welfare and pension payments.
But the bigger battle with the millions of ordinary Britons who rely on welfare support and the armies of bureaucrats who run the schemes is only beginning. And it's guaranteed to be bloody.
The size and complexity of Britain's welfare structure remains mind-boggling. Overall, it spends around £192 billion (S$397 billion) a year on welfare.
The Department for Work and Pensions - Mr Duncan Smith's empire - administers 27 different types of benefits; other British ministries and local authorities operate a similar number of schemes yet again.
One of the reasons the system is so complex is that, although most of Britain's welfare and social security benefits were introduced between the 1940s and 1960s, some have their roots well in the Depression years after World War I.
Politicians did not help either. Since inventing new welfare benefits is a vote-winner, successive governments added fresh layers of entitlements.
There is also the familiar problem of every welfare state: regardless of how fast a country's economy grows, some people will always be poor, because poverty is ultimately a relative concept.
So, a welfare system meant to 'eradicate the scourge of poverty' - as its inventors claimed - keeps growing despite the fact that, by definition, it can never achieve this objective.
What is more, the system is wasteful and open to fraud, stifles any sense of personal responsibility and creates a national culture of dependency on the state.
Most examples of waste stem from the curious British obsession with distributing some payments to all citizens, regardless of actual needs.
This is the case with benefits paid to any family with children under the age of 16, assistance with paying winter fuel bills, or the provision of free public transport for anyone aged over 60. Since the number of individual payments is huge, the amounts tend to be small. So, perversely, those who need the money most don't get the right assistance, while those who don't need often forget that they are being paid.
Fraud is also inevitable in a welfare structure which regularly distributes payments to no less than 15 per cent of the working population, in addition to those retired or disabled. False claimants run little risk of being caught, partly because this requires serious investigations, but also because of the sheer volume of work: 19 million payments are processed by the Department of Work and Pensions each year. According to current estimates, £5.2 billion worth of these claims are fraudulent.
And then, there is the so-called 'benefits trap', which is probably the biggest failure of the concept. Because many of those who draw jobless benefits are badly educated, their only hope of employment is in poorly paid jobs. But the salaries on offer in such positions can be lower than the social security benefits. Unsurprisingly, most of these people choose to stay at home, watching daytime television.
Either way, a system which was designed to help those who are temporarily without work ends up creating a class of permanently unemployed.
Yet reform is easier said than done.
One option is to withdraw unemployment support only gradually; this could encourage people to accept low-paid positions, in the knowledge that they would still be entitled to some government money. But that's very expensive, and a nightmare to administer.
A second approach would be to introduce 'means tests' for universal benefits; only those who are too poor or needy would get government support. The snag here is that the introduction of tests is political dynamite.
And then, there is always the option of reducing welfare payments altogether. The Conservative-led government has already tightened housing benefit payments, and told lone parents that they must seek work once their youngest child starts school.
Faced with the biggest crisis in government finances in decades, Mr Duncan Smith has opted for streamlining the entire welfare structure into just a number of major schemes, while waging 'war' against fraudsters.
But the Treasury, which holds all the purse strings, is opposing the plans. The reason for this curious twist: paradoxically, because the system is dysfunctional, it's also so complicated that it deters some from claiming what they are due.
Non-governmental organisations estimate that up to £16 billion of benefits which could be disbursed never leave the state coffers. So, a newly streamlined welfare project which makes entitlements easier to understand could leave taxpayers with a heftier bill because more people may be encouraged to claim.
For the moment, there is a compromise: Mr Duncan Smith was given £2.5 billion in extra funds, on the condition that his department will start producing £10 billion worth of savings by 2014.
It will be a tall order. And Mr Duncan Smith is still careful to skirt around one fundamental issue: whether the welfare system should be a social enabler by helping people to help themselves, or whether it should continue with just administering pain-killers to the country's social ills.
That, as always, remains a matter left to future generations to decide.
The size and complexity of Britain's welfare structure remains mind-boggling. Overall, it spends around £192 billion (S$397 billion) a year on welfare.
Sunday, 12 September 2010
'Disabled' man showed off fancy dance moves
LONDON: Terence Read is the sort of person who should inspire admiration. The 61-year-old is a picture of perfect health: At a recent dance competition in Manchester, he twirled his partner on the dance floor in a routine that included the Charleston and jitterbug.
Unfortunately for him, a secret agent from Britain's Department for Work and Pensions was also present.
And for good reason: According to government records, Read can barely walk and has claimed about £20,000 (S$41,400) in disability benefits over the past decade.
So the dance contest ended up badly: Read was arrested and sentenced to 12 months of unpaid community service.
According to official government figures, welfare fraud costs the British taxpayer about £5.2 billion a year.
The biggest obstacle to fighting fraud is the fact that Britons do not have to carry identity cards; verifying their claims or even their names and residences can be difficult.
But British commercial organisations can collect plenty of personal data about people.
The country's credit agencies - used by banks and credit card companies to assess the standing and honesty of potential borrowers - hold every detail about a person's spending patterns, as well as the property he owns or rents.
So the government has now tied up with these agencies, which will be paid a percentage of any fraudulent claim they manage to uncover.
The government has also resorted to more original methods to detect fraud.
Kim Stokes, who claimed £15,000 in social security benefits as a single mother of two young children, forgot this tiny detail when she posted on Facebook pictures of herself with her 'hubby', with whom she claimed to be 'very much in love'.
Unfortunately for her, government inspectors also have Facebook accounts and noted her profile.
Nobody pretends that such measures will eliminate fraud, although the government hopes the amount of publicity given to these cases will deter future transgressors.
But the public remains furious about a different problem with welfare abuse: that of public housing.
Under Britain's laws, the local authorities are obliged to provide a roof for anyone who is homeless in their area, even if the person is a foreigner applying for asylum. Hundreds of thousands of such claims are made each year and the local authorities often end up housing them in hotels or expensive commercially rented properties.
The claimants carry no responsibility: The more children they have, the greater the property they are entitled to.
And, to make matters worse, some of those who get public housing subsequently sublet their property to others, and make a profit.
A National Fraud Initiative - a data-matching operation run by the government - is now designed to catch such cheats.
But the results remain insignificant: only 75 fraudsters were caught in the last three years.
JONATHAN EYAL
Spending cuts around Europe
A protester's sign reads: 'Grandpa, grandma at work, young people unemployed, no thanks'. -- PHOTO: AGENCE FRANCE- PRESSE
BRITONS are not the only ones feeling the pain in Europe. In Dublin, Athens, Madrid and Paris, it is the era of smaller government, with public sectors being pruned and welfare spending reduced. Here is a brief look at the experience of four other European countries.
IRELAND
The first to take the bitter medicine. The Emerald Isle has been called the poster boy for deficit cutting, as it has pruned spending, benefits and salaries with remarkably little resistance from its unions or people.
Its budget deficit has come down from 14.3 per cent last year to 11 per cent this year, but at a huge cost. Public sector salaries have fallen by 13 per cent. The economy has contracted.
Unemployment is now at 13.7 per cent, prices and rents are falling, and the country is experiencing brutal deflation.
GREECE
The government has been much more rigorous in slashing spending than many had thought possible. Officials from the International Monetary Fund and the European Union have been full of praise.
Civil servants have seen salaries fall and perks disappear, but unemployment is rising sharply. Households and businesses remain deeply pessimistic. Few believe that, despite all the hardship, the country can avoid defaulting down the road. Others believe the cuts have gone too far.
SPAIN
Public sector wages have been cut and infrastructure projects postponed or abandoned. The country is cutting spending when unemployment among young people is at 41.5 per cent.
Some say that reducing demand, with so many out of work, flies in the face of conventional wisdom. There are signs that the Spanish government is wobbling over the extent of its austerity package. It recently announced an extra €500 million (S$852 million) for infrastructure projects next year.
FRANCE
This week, its reforms faced a stiff test on the streets, with unions protesting against the plan to raise the retirement age to 62. President Nicolas Sarkozy has said the changes are non-negotiable.
But governments have buckled before in the country, in the face of street protests. The problem this time round is that investors will be watching for weak nerves.
A concession on pension reform could indicate that the government lacks the will to enforce the €40 billion austerity package.
BBC NEWS SERVICE
Thursday, 9 September 2010
Reflection on movie 'Hotel Rwanda'
I think it was an excellent movie as it touched my heart deeply. This movie describes the killings and genocides that happened in Rwanda very well. I could not believe that it actually happened in Rwanda. I think what moves some of the Hutus to do the mass killings was the media that kept on “brainwashing” them to wipe out the Tutsis. The media was cunning to drive the Hutus mad and enraged by broadcasting the message through radios. The media’s target was mostly to the uneducated people who could be easily enraged by their emotions. If they were educated enough (like the hotel manager, Paul, who saved a lot of Hutus and Tutsis), they would not go around in a killing spree and let their emotions control them. That is why it is important for us to understand the cause of this horrible event and to acknowledge it.
Nadia.L.Soh, 3EA
Because of the film that has been shown to me, I had a further understanding of the effects of internal conflict in countries. The effects were dreadful and innocent people were killed, wounded and psychologically tramatised because of the violence. I also learnt that even if we have sound thinking, we would still turn violent and resort to mass killings. We only need something or someone to trigger it and in the case of Rwanda, it only took one man, the media (radio broadcast) to trigger the Hutus to go on a killing spree.
It was really sad that innocent people were involved and even children were horrendously killed. I hope that whatever happened to Rwanda will not happen ever again, be it on Rwanda on other parts of the world.
To avoid this kind of conflicts, I think we should learn to be tolerant towards others and try to understand each other without letting our emotions take over our sound minds.
After watching this movie ‘Hotel Rwanda’, I realized it is really important to promote harmony among different races. Misunderstanding between people may lead to very big unhappiness and even deep hatred. The hatred overwhelmed certain people and they will start to use violence. Many innocent people will be involved.
I think civil war is mainly influenced by media. The media gives such information to create huge misunderstanding between two parties. As people are brainwashed by the media, they resort to violence to express their feelings of anger, envy and hatred towards another group of people.
Wednesday, 25 August 2010
Saturday, 21 August 2010
Food supplies most at risk in Afghanistan
Aug 20, 2010
Index tags poor nations with conflicts as highly vulnerable
The Food Security Risk Index 2010 is compiled by a British risk analysis firm, Maplecroft, on the basis of 12 factors drawn up in collaboration with the United Nations' World Food Programme.
The criteria include rates of malnutrition, cereal production and imports, gross domestic product per capita, risk of extreme weather events, quality of agricultural and distribution infrastructure, conflict, and government effectiveness.
The poorest nations and those with conflicts have the greatest difficulties in ensuring their population has access to sufficient food, Maplecroft said.
Afghanistan was judged to be at the highest risk despite the billions of dollars of aid pumped into development projects since the 2001 United States-led invasion that overthrew the Taleban.
'The ongoing conflict in Afghanistan impacts infrastructure readiness, and the capability for distribution of supplies is greatly reduced,' Ms Fiona Place, an environmental analyst with Maplecroft, said.
'It's the impact on the road networks and the telecommunications infrastructure.'
Of the 50 nations most at risk, 36 were from sub-Saharan Africa and grappling with poor harvests and failing transport networks.
Among countries that were rated at 'high risk' or with unreliable supplies were Bangladesh, Pakistan, India and the Philippines, while countries deemed at 'medium' risk included China.
'Pakistan and sub-Saharan Africa which are dependent on food imports are going to be all the more vulnerable,' Ms Alyson Warhurst, head of Maplecroft, said.
Maplecroft attributed climate change to the leap in wheat prices this year and warned of harsh consequences for vulnerable nations.
Russia's worst drought in half a century prompted the country on Aug 5 to ban grain exports. Cereal production in Canada has been hit by flooding, while extreme temperatures in Ukraine and Kazakhstan have lowered cereal output, according to Maplecroft.
Ms Warhurst said the Russian export ban would add pressure on China to supply more food to world markets at a time when its domestic wheat and meat consumption were rising.
Maplecroft said it hoped the index could help in directing food aid or to guide investments in food production.
The most favourably placed countries with a low risk were the developed economies of North America and Western Europe, with Finland the most food-secure, followed by Sweden, Denmark and Norway.
Some European nations, including Italy, Greece and Portugal, had a medium risk.
Those nations 'don't produce enough of their own food supply, so they're dependent on importing', Ms Warhurst said. 'Basically, they're going to have to pay more for their imports.'
AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE, REUTERS
1. What are the factors used as consideration to determine a country's food security?
2. Why do poor countries have difficulty in accessing food?
3. Which region has the worst food security problem and why?
4. What do you think about Singapore's food security? Explain why.
Wednesday, 11 August 2010
Made in Defu Lane. Sold in UK's Selfridges
Local company Chye Choon - which manufactures the Peacock brand of bee hoon - supplies its noodles to 15 countries around the world. China, Japan, Malaysia, Indonesia and Australia are the biggest importers of made-in-Singapore food products. -- ST PHOTOS: BRYAN VAN DER BEEK
But what may have been an unsophisticated plan to sell its bee hoon overseas has worked wonders for Chye Choon Foods. From mainly supplying to Singapore hawkers and markets, the home-grown company - which makes the Peacock brand of dried bee hoon - now exports the rice vermicelli to 15 countries, including Russia and Lebanon.
'It was the only way to grow,' said Chye Choon owner Jimmy Soh of his leap of faith to venture abroad.
'Singapore is a small market and there is a lot of opportunity overseas.'
It is a view shared by a growing number of local food manufacturers.
Smaller companies are now joining the big boys such as Yeo Hiap Seng and Prima Food in contributing to the growth of Singapore-manufactured food exports.
Made-in-Singapore food products - from condiments and dried food to frozen fishballs and rendang premixes - hit a record $3.5 billion last year, an increase of nearly $1 billion since 2005, with China, Japan, Malaysia, Indonesia and Australia the biggest importers.
And while this makes up only a small proportion of the $200 billion worth of products exported from Singapore last year - including more expensive items which are only partially made in Singapore, like electronic parts - the rate at which the numbers are growing is encouraging.
The Singapore Food Manufacturers' Association (SFMA) - which has 286 members - predicts exports to hit the $4 billion mark this year. Said SFMA president Wong Mong Hong: 'Our members are very excited to break into new markets. There is a sense of pride when they see their brands on shelves overseas, and of course it means more sales.'
The steady growth of exports can be put down to three reasons, say experts: the increasing number of local manufacturers, companies' willingness to expand overseas, and more foreign demand for local products.
There are now 781 local manufacturers, of which half are pushing their products overseas. This is higher than in 2005 when there were 677 companies, of which 300 exported.
A stagnant local market - which has hovered around the $2.5 billion mark since 2004 - has also forced firms to venture overseas. Overseas demand for Singapore products has gone up too, said International Enterprise (IE) Singapore, which promotes the overseas growth of Singapore-based businesses.
'There is a growing acceptance of ethnic cuisine and demand for greater food variety in developed countries,' said Mr Daniel Seah, director of IE Singapore's food division. He added that 'the distinctive flavour of Singapore food' in local products is also a big reason for the success of such products overseas, with items like Prima's laksa paste popular in Russia and canned chrysanthemum tea highly sought after in Switzerland.
The government statutory board has also given local companies a leg-up in recent years. In October last year, IE Singapore arranged for 11 local companies - including Chye Choon Foods - to display products at the famous Selfridges Food Hall in Oxford Street, London, for a week.
Currently, more than 20 local brands are on the shelves of 15 Jusco supermarkets in Guangdong, China, as part of a month-long campaign that also stops in Beijing and Shanghai.
The SFMA started organising similar programmes in 2006. It now organises eight to 12 overseas trade shows yearly for companies to showcase products.
And while big players like Yeo Hiap Seng, which exports to over 60 countries, have been a presence overseas for over 30 years, newcomer Tai Hua Food Industries is closing the gap. The Jalan Besut firm makes about 5,000 tonnes of soya sauce a year and now supplies it to 40 countries, up from half that number five years ago.
For Defu Lane-based Chye Choon Foods, the Selfridges stint led to a permanent spot on the store's shelves. The company now devotes about 15 per cent of the 20 tonnes of bee hoon it makes daily to overseas markets.
Chye Choon's owner Mr Soh, whose products are also sold at the upmarket Whole Foods Market chain in the United States, hopes to double his exports in the next five years. He said: 'Traders overseas are also very open to import our stuff because Singapore is synonymous with quality.'
Experts say the growth spells good news. It not only enhances the Singapore brand but may also lead to lower cost of food for the Singapore market in the long run, said Singapore Polytechnic retail management senior lecturer Sarah Lim.
'As local companies grow, money will be ploughed back to improve the production and quality of goods here,' she said. 'As they grow, these companies will reap economies of scale which will mean cheaper products for locals in the long run.'
Friday, 30 July 2010
Notes on Conflict in Sri Lanka
These are some beautiful notes made by 3EA. Left to right: Jarah, Delyshya, Farhan Rashid. Weili, Jieyi, Nadia. Jeremy, Natalia and Rayselyn.
