Some people out there love to keep animals at home while others don’t or can’t keep them in the home. In fact, there are so many pet owners who swear either by dogs or cats or a variety of other animals, but personal preferences aside, the scientific and medical literature seems to agree that there are strong benefits to keeping pets at home compared to those who have no pets at all. In this article, we talk about some of the benefits that caring for pets have on their owners and their family.

Research has shown that keeping a pet can greatly reduce the amount of stress experienced by the family owning the pet. Could you really still feel so stressed out when a cute little puppy looks at you with its eyes, or when a soft cat rubs up against your leg? In fact, some research done has suggested that keeping pets can be so beneficial to your health that the reduction in blood pressure caused by having pets can be even greater than the effects of taking medication. Read the rest of this entry »

Whenever you’re out shopping, I wonder just how many of us actually bother to read the labels or figure out where the ingredients come from. I’ve done a little bit of searching around to see if I can discover where they come from and there really are some foods out there that you might think about avoiding if only you knew the origins of the ingredients.

Nutella, for example, is one of the most popular chocolate and hazelnut spreads out there. But did you know that the main ingredient of Nutella is neither chocolate nor hazelnut? If you look closely at the label, you’ll notice the main ingredients of this popular breakfast spread is water and “modified vegetable oils”, which is what makes the product so creamy and smooth. Would you still be interested in eating Nutella if you knew this from the start? We’re not sure, but it’s definitely food for thought – do you really want to eat this for your breakfast? Read the rest of this entry »

This is one of those issues that matters particularly to nations with a rapidly increasing population or very limited areas of usable land. Although Malaysia isn’t generally some of these, the issue of land reclamation is important on Penang island. Closer to home, however, Singapore has been famous for being particularly aggressive with reclaiming land for use, as well as Hong Kong and Japan, all of which have been cited as necessary given the limited amount of land available for use in these densely populated countries.

However, despite the fact that land reclamation is commonly viewed as necessary particularly in these densely populated parts of the world, the process is not without controversy. The land reclamation process cannot continue unless very detailed environmental impact studies are done to ensure that the negative impact on the environment is minimal. Even so, there are sometimes problems and disputes, such as what happened in the Central reclamation project in Hong Kong (an article is here) where Read the rest of this entry »

In these times when the H1N1 outbreak has become a pandemic and governments all over the world are scrambling to mitigate the worst effects of the virus, it has become more important to ensure that our homes are cleaned as well as they possibly can to remove anything that may compromise our immune system and leave us open to infection. In fact, according to the Centers for Disease Control in the United States, the single most important thing that we can do to prevent the spread of disease is to ensure that the surfaces that people touch around the home are regularly disinfected – these include surfaces such as kitchen worktops, doorknobs and handles.

We’re normally reassured when we use industrial or hospital strength disinfectants to thoroughly cleanse the house but that is probably overkill. Some of the stronger disinfectants can be very hazardous to the environment and can release strong fumes that can be detrimental to your health. You don’t need to go so far, many of the disinfectants for use at home can be strong enough to give you a more than adequate level of protection for you and your family. Make sure that Read the rest of this entry »

Hey, you young folks! We are calling your participation in our most anticipated environmental event, the Swishing Party. This time round, it will be back with more perks on 15 August 2009 @ Tropicana City Mall (Atrium).

Returning as one of the highlights of our LOVE QOOZO, LOVE EARTH environmental activities, it will be held in conjunction with the International Youth Day, co-organized by AIESEC Malaysia, world’s largest non-profitable student organization & Tropicana City Mall. Read the rest of this entry »

Recently, the National Consumer Campaign organised by the Federation of Malaysian Consumers Associations (FOMCA) held a Hari Tidak Berbelanja on the 16th of July. The core idea behind this concept is not a rejection of any particular brands or of consumer products in general, but to highlight the fact that rampant consumerist behaviour can be very damaging to your wallet, which can further have effects on the mental wellbeing of families (in fact, financial stress is most frequently cited as the major cause of divorces in many parts of the world), as well as the environment.

If you didn’t take part in this event, here’s a brief rundown of what happened during the day. The idea was to live an entire day without spending your money on any purchases. Of course, you will still need to eat and pay for the electricity you use, but the point wasn’t to reject everything financial. A truly effective campaign would have to last longer to have any lasting effect on consumer moods, but the idea was to Read the rest of this entry »

It’s definitely popular to save cute creatures such as koala bears or dolphins – we’re definitely not going to dispute that there are great benefits to that. But in the process of concentrating on “photogenic” animals, a whole class of other animals who are important to the ecosystem and who are equally deserving of aid tends to be ignored. In this article, we talk about frogs and mention other amphibians, and put forward a case for why they are also deserving of help.

It’s easy to think of frogs as just another pest and you might even think that they don’t need any help because it seems like they just pop up everywhere especially after a rainstorm. However, frogs play an important role in the ecosystem. Research has shown that tadpoles play a key role in ensuring that the algae at the base of the food chain remain productive (source: this article) and grown frogs are also known for being able to keep the population of insects such as flies and mosquitos in check. In fact, frogs are Read the rest of this entry »

While we had quite a success here in Malaysia with Earth Day, we find that the Europeans always have to be one step ahead in their willingness to make serious personal sacrifices for environmental purposes. We’ve recently seen this scheme organised in the city of Ghent in Belgium that we think is truly a wonderful idea although one that demands great personal sacrifice.

According to this article on the BBC, the city of Ghent is planning to become the first city in the world to go completely vegetarian at least once a week. Although we’re not sure about the full details of the scheme (since the website on the scheme is in Dutch), the idea is simple but bold. City politicians and public officials will be the first to take the lead by declaring one day a week a completely vegetarian day and will have vegetarian meals for the entire day. Schoolchildren will Read the rest of this entry »