By Coeli Carr Tuesday, Oct. 06, 2009

Ever wonder why some youngsters approach food as an adventure and others insist on mono-meals of mac 'n' cheese? Turns out kiddie palates don't happen by accident. Studies show that children prefer the flavors they experience early on, including while they're in the womb. A pediatrician is drawing on that research to help get more pregnant and nursing women to eat healthy, varied diets — because doing so will make their babies predisposed to eat what's good for them.

According to Alan Greene, a clinical professor of pediatrics at Stanford University and the author of the new Feeding Baby Green, children can acquire what he calls nutritional intelligence, which will help them choose healthy food later in life. And this intelligence springs from food imprinting, which begins during gestation. "How a child learns to eat is one of the most important health issues in this country," he says. "It's learned behavior."
(See nine kid foods to avoid.)

SANDER L.GILMAN
2009/10/07

WE are, supposedly, in the midst of an obesity epidemic. Everyone is getting fatter. Children are fatter than their parents. Epidemics caused by fat are now manifest: Type 2 diabetes, increased rates of heart and cardiovascular disease, and notably, more cancers, such as breast cancer. This "globesity" epidemic is seen in poor countries as well as in wealthy ones.

But are people really so unhealthily fat? Certainly there are morbidly obese people, whose weight puts their lives at risk. Consider the British jailer Daniel Lambert (1770-1809), who stood 1.55m tall and weighed 335kg, yet neither drank nor ate "more than one dish at a meal". At his death, Lambert was remembered as a man of great "temperance". In other words, he was deemed to be healthy and happy.

2009/10/07

By Suganthi Suparmaniam

KUALA LUMPUR: Life in Malaysia was better last year compared with 2007, according to United Nations' statistics.

The country had a 0.829 rating out of a maximum possible score of 1 last year, marginally higher than the 0.805 it scored the previous year.

Tuesday October 6, 2009

KUALA LUMPUR: The Transport Minister wants more Klang Valley folk to use public transport but recognises that services first need to be improved.

Datuk Seri Ong Tee Keat said he was willing to hear the concerns of consumers as well as players in the public transportation sector.
 
Currently, only 16% of the Klang Valley’s population uses public transport and the Government would like to increase this figure to 25%.

Tuesday, September 29th, 2009
United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. ASEAN
 
BANGKOK: United Nations climate change talks kicked off in the Thai capital yesterday with reminders that  time is quickly running out for finalising a new “climate deal” in Copenhagen in December. “Time is not  pressing, it has almost run out,” said Yvo de Boer, executive secretary of the United Nations Framework
Convention on Climate Change.

Some 4,000 participants and observers have gathered in Bangkok to attend two weeks of meetings aimed at finalising the negotiating text for the next climate deal to be considered at the coming world climate summit in Copenhagen.