Category: Environment EN

A thriving urban forest can plant the seed of wellness in the minds and hearts of people navigating the dense brush of mental illness. Research shows that access to trees reduces rates of depression, lowers levels of the brain’s main stress hormone, cortisol, and improves cognitive function. This is especially true in cities and urban areas, where residents are significantly more likely to...

With temperatures rising and pressure on biodiversity growing, insects vital to our ecosystems are not only moving north and south, but up. Around the world, different species are shifting their habitats upwards, with potentially catastrophic results for our ecosystems. Bumblebees in the Pyrenees have moved upwards on average by more than a metre a year, with some species making significantly...

Adopting sustainable cooling strategies in daily life in the face of rising temperatures is important to mitigate climate change. What are the easy and environmentally-friendly ways to keep cool in extreme heat? Cooling the person instead of the surrounding air is more practical and this can be practised on the individual level. The Lancet infographic below outlines 8 such easy and eco-friendly...

They've brewed up a plastic alternative that is transparent, nonabsorbent (i.e., won’t get soggy) and disappears in two months—and for a bonus, it’s edible.   By Emma Bryce Packaging with all the strength and resilience of plastic, but without its environmental impacts: this would seem too good to be true. Yet a group of researchers say it’s exactly what they have created:...

Thin plastic bags are now banned in New Zealand supermarkets. This new ruling makes New Zealand the world's first country to expand its ban on plastic bags in supermarkets to thin bags, which are typically used to hold fruits or vegetables. The new move is expected to prevent the usage of 150 million plastic bags per year. Read more:      

Sahabat Alam Malaysia was surprised to read a media report quoting Gamuda Bhd that the Penang South Reclamation (PSR) project will begin on July 1, 2023. This is because the fishermen's appeal has yet to be heard and decided. On 25 May 2023, the Penang State Fishermen's Association (Pen Mutiara), the South Penang Area Fishermen's Association and Zakaria Ismail, for and on behalf of the Sungai...

Ocean warming is not only depleting fish stocks in the ocean, it is also resulting in smaller fish sizes and even displacement of certain species, a local study has revealed. The current hot spell is not helping and to make matters worse, floods and droughts have directly or indirectly affected fishermen’s catch, experts said. Universiti Malaysia Terengganu (UMT) vice-chancellor Prof Datuk Dr...

There are health risks from each part of the plastic lifecycle. > The extraction of fossil fuels, used as feedstocks in manufacturing plastic, results in air and water pollution and other direct impacts to communities such as increased traffic and pipeline construction (more than 99% of plastic made today is made using fossil fuels). > Refining and producing the plastic resins and...