The head of a green group has been suspended indefinitely, surprising many in the environmental scene.

Mr Edwin Seah, 46, who has been executive director of the Singapore Environment Council (SEC) since April last year, was told of the move yesterday morning while on leave.

He said he was told via a phone call from the council’s executive committee chairman Lam Joon Khoi.

“I’m shocked because no reason was given, and I was due to travel tomorrow night on official business,” he told The Straits Times.

He was due to fly to Ukraine tonight for the annual general meeting and elections for the Global Eco-labelling Network, of which he is an elected board member.

An SEC spokesman said:”The SEC Board has decided to suspend Edwin Seah with effect from today.

We are unable to comment further as investigations are ongoing.”

ST understands the council will hold a committee of inquiry next Wednesday.

The non-governmental organisation spreads environmental awareness through training programmes, awards and its Singapore Green Labelling Scheme.

It was started in 1995 and has 28 full-time staff.

Mr Seah, who was previously at the Singapore Tourism Board and Energy Market Authority, was nominated along with SEC former eco-certification head Kavickumar Muruganathan for The Straits Times Singaporean of the Year award last year.

They were recognised for raising awareness about the link between the haze and unsustainable paper products.

Mr Seah’s suspension is the latest in a string of personnel changes in the charity.

In April, Mr Kavickumar, 27, left to join Asia Pulp and Paper (APP).

Former chief executive Jose Raymond, 44, also joined APP in January but left last month and has since set up his own public relations firm.

Professor Ang Peng Hwa, who co-founded the Haze Elimination Action Team volunteer group, said he was shocked by the news, especially as he had just met Mr Seah at an SEC event on Wednesday.

“With all the recent personnel changes this year, it seems like it is a spell of bad luck for SEC,” he said.

This article was first published on Oct 14, 2016.
Get a copy of The Straits Times or go to straitstimes.com for more stories.

A multi-agency effort is under way to help the 51 stallholders affected by a fire that destroyed their wet market and two coffee shops in Jurong on Tuesday.

Jurong GRC MP Ang Wei Neng met the stallholders last night, along with representatives of the Housing Board, the National Environment Agency (NEA), the Ministry of Social and Family Development (MSF) and the Singapore Civil Defence Force (SCDF).

The HDB and NEA provided the affected stallholders, from blocks 493 and 494 in Jurong West Street 41, with a list of 27 market stalls and 22 food stalls that are available in Clementi and Ghim Moh.

Stallholders who are interested will get assistance to relocate to the new stalls, where monthly rental costs are between $200 and $850.

“Business is expected to resume within a month,” the HDB said.

Rental costs and service and conservancy charges for the wet market operator will be waived for the period it cannot operate, on the condition that the stallholders in turn are not charged.

The HDB and NEA will work with the owners of the two coffee shops.

The MSF’s Social Service Office in Taman Jurong is providing assistance to stallholders, and immediate relief funds will be disbursed by Southwest CDC.

Mr Ang said a new market “may take a year-plus to build”.

The immediate priority is to find alternative stalls at other markets so that the stallholders can resume business as soon as possible.

“We have decided to provide an emergency relief fund of $500 to each of the stallholders tonight,” Mr Ang added.

Mr Derek Tan, owner of the Block 494 coffee shop, said it might take about four months before he could reopen.

Stallholders told The Straits Times that they would rather stay in the area as some of them live there or have regular customers.

This article was first published on Oct 14, 2016.
Get a copy of The Straits Times or go to straitstimes.com for more stories.

Singapore and Australia signed four key agreements yesterday that will boost co-operation in trade, defence, innovation and combating transnational drug crime.

They include an upgraded free trade agreement (FTA) that will make it easier for Singaporean professionals and entrepreneurs to work in Australia and vice versa.

There is also a A$2.25 billion (S$2.35 billion) defence deal that will see both sides jointly develop military training facilities in Australia. The upgraded FTA comes into force next year, and defence co-operation planning starts early next year.

Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong and Australian PM Malcolm Turnbull said in a joint statement that the agreements represent the “most substantial upgrade in the Australia-Singapore relationship in a generation”.

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PM Lee in Australia

Source:

AFP

Lianhe Zaobao

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Benefits in four key areas

Of the four Comprehensive Strategic Partnership (CSP) agreements signed yesterday, one will see trade ties being deepened while the other three will see Singapore and Australia collaborate more closely in the areas of defence, scientific research and anti-drug trafficking.

The upgraded Free Trade Agreement will come into force next year and planning for the expansion of new military training areas in Australia will start early next year.

These are some of the benefits under the agreements:

Trade

• More flexible rules of origin, which are standards used to determine the origin of goods, will make it easier for Singapore exports to qualify for tariff-free treatment in Australia.
• Reduction in regulatory barriers, such as onerous labelling requirements, will facilitate trade in goods like wine, cosmetics and medical devices.
• Opportunities for companies from both sides to bid for government procurement contracts.
• Easier mobility and longer stays for business people.

Defence

• New A$2.25 billion (S$2.35 billion) programme will allow the Singapore Armed Forces to conduct unilateral training in Australia for 18 weeks, in areas 10 times the size of Singapore, for up to 14,000 troops per year over 25 years.
• Joint development of military training areas and advanced facilities in Australia.

Science research and innovation

• The Singapore and Australian governments will provide about S$50 million worth of support for collaboration in science and innovation.
• More co-operation between research institutions, such as between Singapore universities and Australia’s Data61 to look into big data and smart cities.
• Shared use of research infrastructure – like supercomputing centres in both countries – to realise a greater return on investments, spread expenses, allow for maintenance of infrastructure, and let researchers improve their research by accessing a wider range of facilities and intellectual cultures.
• Establishing Australia’s fifth landing pad in Singapore to facilitate the foray of high-tech Australian start-ups into Asia.

International drug crime

• Singapore’s Central Narcotics Bureau and the Australian Federal Police will conduct joint training, learning and development programmes and officer exchanges to combat the proliferation of drugs, especially new psychoactive substances. 

This article was first published on Oct 14, 2016.
Get a copy of The Straits Times or go to straitstimes.com for more stories.

Singapore’s growth in the third quarter badly missed expectations on Friday, potentially signaling weakness around the region.

The city-state’s gross domestic product (GDP) grew 0.6 per cent on-year in the third quarter, well off forecasts for 1.7 per cent growth from a Reuters poll and the weakest reading since 2009, during the global financial crisis.

GDP also contracted 4.1 per cent on-quarter, compared with a Reuters poll forecast for 0.3 per cent growth.

“Singapore being a small open economy, basically we are like a harbinger,” Selena Ling, head of treasury research and strategy at OCBC, told CNBC’s “Squawk Box” on Friday.

“You can expect the next few weeks when we get third quarter growth numbers coming out from the rest of the Asian economies, probably you’ll see weaker than expected numbers as well.”

She called Singapore’s data “pretty grim,” noting that even the most bearish forecast hadn’t called such weak figures.

Despite the weak data, Singapore’s central bank, the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) kept its monetary policy unchanged with a neutral bias for the currency.

Rather than using interest rates, the MAS, which has official policy-setting meetings just twice a year, sets its monetary policy by adjusting an undisclosed trading band for the currency based on a basket of currencies weighted to reflect trade levels with the city-state.

In the wake of the GDP data and the MAS’ inaction, the Singapore dollar fell to its lowest level since early March. The US dollar was fetching as much as S$1.3887 by mid-day Friday, up from levels as low as S$1.3770 earlier in the session.

OCBC’s Ling said external factors dragged on Singapore’s growth.

“Ahead on the horizon, you do have some risk events like US elections. You also have a possible FOMC rate hike in December. So these are pretty big external factors,” she said. “The China slowdown story is still on-going so you do have renewed concerns about how much of the softness in terms of the Chinese manufacturing export pattern is going to drag on regional trade growth as well.”

She noted that the World Trade Organisation (WTO) had already downgraded global trade forecasts for 2016 and 2017. The WTO has projected global trade would register its fifth straight year of sub-3 per cent growth, citing shifting exchange rates and falls in commodity prices.

The slowdown was already evident in China’s trade figures. Data released Thursday showed China’s exports tumbled 10.0 per cent in dollar terms in September and imports fell 1.9 per cent, coming in well below forecasts from a Reuters poll for a 3.0 per cent fall in exports and a 1.0 per cent rise in imports.