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First they try to pull a fast one riding on the death of LKY, now they pass off package drinks as freshly prepared, and staffs spotted icing a bengawa solo cake. What next???...LOL BreadTalk stops selling soya milk; confirms that item was repackaged from Yeo's packet drink A photograph of a BreadTalk staff member using a packet of Yeo's soya bean milk to fill up bottles for sale has drawn ire from netizens.PHOTO: THE NEW PAPER PUBLISHEDAUG 4, 2015, 1:44 PM SGT UPDATED9 HOURS AGO 91.9K 38 4 Jessica Lim Consumer Correspondent SINGAPORE - Confectionary chain BreadTalk has pulled its soya bean drink from its shelves, after a photograph showing an employee filling up plastic bottles with Yeo's brand soya bean milk made its rounds on the Internet. The post, first published on online site Redwire Times on Monday evening, claimed that the chain was selling the packaged soya bean drink as "freshly prepared". Posted by someone known as Kev, the post called the discovery "shocking". "This 'freshly prepared' soya bean milk from BreadTalk always tasted very familiar, but somehow I couldn't figure out why until now. You see for yourself why. This BreadTalk staff is just pouring Yeo's soya bean milk into bottles of 'freshly prepared' soya bean sold by BreadTalk," he said. When contacted, BreadTalk admitted that the drink was from a Yeo's packet, and that it buys the drink in one-litre packs from Yeo's in bulk. The company then repackages it into plain plastic bottles with the words "freshly prepared" on them, seals the bottles, and sells them at its stores. The problem, said the BreadTalk spokesman, arose after the chain used the bottles with "freshly-prepared" labels to package the soy milk. The bottles are also used to package fresh juice for sale. "We have heard our customers' feedback about our bottled soya bean milk," she said. "We would like to apologise for any misaligned presentation or wrong impressions created, and clarify that it is never our intention to mislead." The chain will resume selling the drink out of labelled drink dispensers instead "to prevent misunderstanding", said the spokesman. Retail experts said it is common for eateries to buy in bulk and then repackage items, especially with the current labour crunch. But it is less common for them to sell them as freshly-prepared. "Firms just buy generic products in bulk or outsource production," said Singapore Polytechnic senior retail lecturer Sarah Lim, who added that it is then up to the retailer to decide on pricing. "It depends on demand, rental and other costs." In the case of the soya bean drink, selling it as freshly-prepared would have been unethical as it gave the impression that the drink was brewed in-house. Meanwhile, a picture of a staff member icing a Bengawan Solo layered cake at an Icing Room store, which also comes under BreadTalk, was also posted on Tuesday. It led some to ask if the under-fire bakery was also using cakes from rival bakeries. Insisting that this was the wrong impression, the BreadTalk spokesman said: “A staff member brought in the cake on her own accord to be decorated by a colleague. This is not allowed, and staff will be reminded of that.” http://www.straitstimes.com/singapore/breadtalk-accused-of-selling-packaged-soya-milk-as-freshly-prepared

Looks like its a matter of time before MERS hit Singapore..... Singapore must be prepared for MERS: PM Lee The country's inter-connectivity and how the virus has been seen in neighbours Malaysia and the Philippines means Singapore must assume MERS will enter the country, says Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong. SINGAPORE: The Republic must assume that the Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) can and will enter the country, given its inter-connectivity and how neighbours such as Malaysia and the Philippines have had MERS cases, said Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong on Thursday (Jun 11). In a visit to Tan Tock Seng Hospital, Mr Lee said: "For us it's a matter of time, and for us, I wanted to be quite sure that our medical facilities our medical staff, the hospitals, the whole team are ready and they know how to deal with it. They don't fumble and we can contain it, and then put a stop to the disease in Singapore as quickly as we can." TTSH has been designated by Singapore's Health Ministry to be the hospital for MERS-CoV patient cases once the virus was first identified in Saudi Arabia in 2012. South Korea on Wednesday reported 2 more deaths and 13 more new MERS cases in the country. PUBLIC NEEDS TO KNOW HOW TO RESPOND The Singapore public also needs to know how to respond, Mr Lee added. If one has travelled and feels unwell, or displays flu symptoms, these individuals should take it seriously and visit the hospital to get checked, he said. If there were to be MERS cases in the country, Singaporeans should not get into a panic, but know that the country is prepared and what can be done, he said. TTSH said it has a robust preparedness plan to handle global pandemic threats, along with the dedicated facilities. The hospital has started screening for suspect cases since 2012. It said all suspected and confirmed cases at the hospital will be isolated and managed under strict airborne infection control precautions. It added processes are in place at the hospital's Emergency Department, to evaluate and screen patients with clinical signs of respiratory illnesses and a travel history to suspected regions. If suspected, patients are managed separately with masks and placed in isolation rooms for further medical consultation. If needed, they will then be admitted into designated isolation wards at the Communicable Diseases Centre (CDC). On Tuesday, Singapore also started temperature screening at air checkpoints for travelers arriving from South Korea. To date, no case of MERS-CoV has been reported in Singapore. But the Health Ministry has previously said the possibility of an imported case here cannot be ruled out given today's globalised travel patterns. - CNA/kk

Had they started burning forest in Indonesia. Its only begining of February 2014 ..... yahoo news: Return of haze feared as Indonesian forest fires reach ‘alarming conditions’ Hazy days may return to Malaysia after it was reported today that hundreds of hectares of forest in Indonesia's Riau province have been ravaged by fire, reaching "alarming conditions", according to the Jakarta Post. The English-language daily reported that a lack of rainfall made fire-fighting efforts more difficult, and thin haze has already blanketed Dumai and Pekanbaru, Riau's capital. “Firefighters experienced difficulties extinguishing the flames as the area is dried peatland,” Riau's Meranti Islands regency forestry agency head M. Murod was quoted as saying. Fires have been burning since last week in the regency, and have spread to Rangsang Island and Tebingtinggi Island, destroying about 200 hectares of land. Murod hoped Jakarta would help the efforts by arranging for cloud seeding to avoid a repeat of the haze which struck neighbouring countries. In June last year, schools in Singapore and Malaysia were shut and state of emergency declared in several areas in Johor after the Air Pollution Index (API) crossed 700. An API rate between 0 to 50 is considered as good, 51-100 as moderate, 101-200 as unhealthy, 201-300 very unhealthy, and above 300 as hazardous. In the past, the dry season, between May and September, was blamed for the haze, as well as on Indonesian farmers who did land clearing for the planting season. The haze last year had also sparked a war of words between Jakarta and officials from Malaysia and Singapore, after an Indonesian minister said Sinaporean and Malaysian companies were to blame for forest-clearing activities. Murod said he could not identify the plantations involved in the latest fires. “The blaze is getting bigger and bigger inside the plantations. It’s difficult to identify. I have just received a report on losses suffered by residents,” he said, as reported by the Jakarta Post. Bengkalis regency's Disaster and Firefighter Agency head Mohammad Jalal meanwhile did not rule out land clearing activities for the latest fires. “We have often warned about avoiding fire in peatland. In the current hot weather and strong winds, the dried peatland could easily burn and it’s difficult to extinguish,” he told the Jakarta Post. – February 3, 2014. link: http://sg.news.yahoo.com/return-haze-feared-indonesian-forest-fires-reach-alarming-043157236.html We are now enjoying North-East wind condition and should the wind direction changes, we will be affected ... Couple with their volcano still throwing ashes into the air. So last year 'papers' which was send to Indon Minister still in their in-tray ......

(Karachi, Dec 27)

Michelin has now made a solid proposal to the FIA after weeks of speculation linking the French tyre supplier with a return to formula one. A Bloomberg report said chief executive Michel Rollier wants an official response soon, with one of the conditions being rule changes to show "the environmental dimension". According to Reuters, managing partner Didier Mariton said after a shareholders' meeting that Michelin will only return if it has a rival tyre supplier to compete with. But Rollier brief reporters that Michelin is prepared to be the only supplier next year as long as the rules allow other companies to also offer their tyres to teams. Source: GMM

SINGAPORE: The Singapore government is prepared to do more to soften the impact of rising food prices

Read today ST and SMRT is applying to LTA to increase the frequency of their train services during morning & evening peak hours and also at lunch time by another 500 more rides with effect in May 2008. So, with extra 500 more serivces, operating & operations cost will increase a lot..... . Electricity tarif remain high, manpower require to run those extra trains services,........etc. In the other hand, LTA trying to convince ppls to use public transports by building more ERPs in heartlands HDB estates, reduce COE,.........etc. So more ppls taking trains, means more services require for both trains operators resulting more operating cost...... So............... will this comes down to one solution, increase in prices .....

Ok a recession may be on the horizon. Maybe not this year in SG but perhaps next depending on how steep the US recession. So how prepared are you if you lose your job? Can sell off car (hopefully dont have to top-up) and survive on your savings for how long? Recommended buffer is at least 6 months salary cos that the estimated time to find another job albeit lower pay.