Over half S’poreans trust in ‘recyclable’ product labels

KUALA LUMPUR: Over 50 per cent and 37 per cent of Singaporeans trust in ‘recyclable’ and ‘sustainably-produced’ product labels, respectively, according to Euromonitor International.

The global market research company shared the figure on its 2019 Lifestyles Survey. Euromonitor International (Home and Garden Research) head, Erika Sirimanne said: “In the future, sustainable lifestyles driven by concern about the environment will involve less meat, no plastic and bulk buying.

“In fact, Singapore was ranked 63rd out of 97 markets in Euromonitor’s Environmental Sustainability Index, with energy and pollution pillars pulling the country’s score down.

“More than 95 per cent of Singapore’s electricity output comes from fossil fuels. In Norway, it is closer to two per cent,” she added.

There is potential for businesses to leverage renewable sources of energy. Solar power is the most viable for Singapore. — Bernama

The power of the Internet has liberated this nation’s news media landscape as it allows companies, communities as well as individuals to operate their own news platforms. This led to traditional news media having to compete with online news portals and channels. Not only was the new playing field foreign to them, but their fresh competitors also have the advantage of working with a cheaper operational model.

While media organisations such as Bernama, New Straits Times, Berita Harian, and Utusan Malaysia, which wound up its operations recently, incur high operational costs to get the news, most portals use the ‘ cut and paste’ ( sometimes with a little tweaking for clickbait purposes) approach to feed their platforms and attract traffic, and generate an income from advertisements.

On a more positive note, Prof Dr Azizul Halim Yahya, Dean of the Faculty of Communication and Media Studies at Mara University of Technology, said while the closure, restructuring and resizing of major media houses have reduced the employability of mass communication graduates, new doors have opened elsewhere.

“Overall, we can see an increase in employability for the graduates but in a different form because today there are so many online news portals and they need our students,” he said.

Azizul Halim said online news platforms would always require manpower trained in news writing skills and equipped with the ability to articulate well so that they can produce stories that appeal to their readers.

New elements in syllabus “Whatever people say about the changing patterns in the journalism landscape as well as