Feb 22, 2012

Environment & Health

Singapore: The World’s “Unhealthiest” Country?

    • I think the same could be said about virtually any major city. It really isn't any surprise, with Singapore being only about 260 square miles, mostly covered by dense urbanization. If Houston, Madrid, Miami, or Riyadh, all cities with similar populations to Singapore, were independent city-states, they would also be ranked very low. As long as Singapore maintains good relations with Malaysia and other neighboring countries, it should not have to worry about the lack of having its own agricultural land, fresh water, or energy sources. Most world cities do not have those in the city proper either, they just happen to be a part of a larger country that does. Singapore was once, briefly, a part of Malaysia, and its ranking appears acceptable. Also, using "unhealthiest" in the title was a very poor choice of words. Sure, one could use the phrase ecological health, but Singapore is one the the world's healthiest countries in physiological health, and the title is simply misleading.

    • A very uninsightful article. Having lived in Singapore and India and visited a few other countries in SEA and the US, I can say that Singapore is very healthy. Sustainability/ecological deficit is what is being measured here, and the author Shibani Mahtani does not seem to understand that throughout the article.

      Singapore faces natural landspace constraints that prevent such a picture-perfect situation from happening. Despite that, the efforts taken by Singapore are commendable. If Shibani were to enter Singapore once, she would be surprised to know that this is the country which cries for land space and still has huge expanses of greenery. Compare that with other cities.

      Singapore does have some areas to improve. Waste management is one of them. Too bad your article just made passing remarks to these, but rather chose to brand the entire country as "unhealthy". Why don't we see how some "healthier" countries manage waste - open dumpyards? Shrinking agricultural lands? Food deficits? (eg: India).

    • this article is NUTS. 90% i m anti-sporean money face but to say spore is last in growth n is unsustainable with NOTHING not even water- lky knew that n 4 50 years laid out plans to overcome water, food, people shortages. our neighbours malaysia want to see us dead--see youtube when mahathir wanted to bomb spore. spore lived for 150 years and its postion as the centre of trade and serives in sea has no competition n with the outward mobility of cash where spore invested in asia, eu and nsa--all goods will be imported since spore owns them like in china's case of buying up the world's resources like iron ore, oil, agriculture, etc.. spore will never die --it is too small with 5/6 million people not like 1.3 billion chinese. for this to happen we must thank lky.....not mahathir.... >>>'someone said ot the phillippines...god gave the country lots of natural resources but bad politicans...'spore/hong kong have no resources but great leaders who can plan ahead to circumvent this unsustainabilty of rich resources countries against the have nots.

    • People who commented above have gone a bit emotional here. I think, if we as a world start believing that everything is fine and nothing has gone wrong. This would lead us to stagnation and perhaps make us prone to major disaster in managing a possible crisis. I think if such research can help nations or as a matter of fact Singapore, then why not? Improvements in processes and technology is an ongoing phenomena. Saying that everything is fine would make our minds stagnant!.

    • This list may be a bit misleading. It seems to be looking at consumption in proportion to natural resources in which case it's quite logical that a city state like Singapore with little agricultural land doesn't get very good results. Argentina may be high on the list but if you just took Buenos Aires and evaluated it on its own as if it were a city state I suspect it wouldn't fare much better.

    • spore LAST in 150 countries ? n lky has reinvented spore from 3rd world country to 1st world country--does it not matter? spore is not fine n dandy--no water , 2060 treaty with malaya will expired but in the last 50 years spore transform herself from no water to newwater n by 2060 spore will be self sufficient in water. this is NO stagnation -this is long term planning. unless u hv been sleeping for 50 years, spore expects to be dependant in almost everything n has taken steps to ensure the forever inflow of necessities with investments in other countries in essentials and food and produces to sustain life here. all the polluted pig farms had been relocated for placements of high value added industries,world's largest oil refinary, enhanced capital markets, services n tourism to garner enough funds to be able to buy what is needed.from the rest of the world... so we r not complacent and not stagnating...we have 50/100 years long term plans.

    • there's an error in the article.
      Malaysia is ranked 80 not 60 according to the link provided.

    • How can Singapore be the world's unhealthiest country? With expansive greenery and clean air, it should fare better than Hong Kong? It is not fair to use ecological deficit as the sole factor in the ranking system. It should also take into account how a country without natural resources addresses their problem in the long term, alleviating the effects of deficit.

    • What are the cancer and obesity rates in Singapore ?
      Far far lower than in the West. Japan has little
      arable land, intensive farming and use of fertilizers
      and pesticides, and yet the Japanese are one of
      the healthiest people on the planet.

      This is a politcal ecological exercise by UBC
      (my alma mater by the way) and in no way
      a scientific survey with measurable data.

    • How come, your report didn't mention Nepal? I was thinking maybe we were in the last.

    • This “ecological deficit” index is useless and rubbish index because it serve no purpose. The same for this article, rubbish article.

    • Interesting as are the nationalist comments. Besides, the approach favors large territories and it is a bit strange to see the US, China and India so high in the ranking - and Ireland, Switzerland and Norway not quite so. I would concur with other comments that the study is a simplistic, yet I read in every other news that Singapore is a concern, particularly lack of drinking water and garbage used as landfill where kids play.

    • Singapore is 100 times greener than anything I saw in China or in any city in India. The air is far cleaner than LA unless you have farmers fires or something like that coming from Sumatra. Singapore is surrounded by water and it rains all the time. I don't think water is going to be an issue in the future at all as it is considered an area of national security. I've jogged around a rather large reservoir they have there also. 10th, 20th, 30th, maaaaaaaybe, but last? Not a chance!

    • this is certainly the hard truth about singapore. little regard is given to the environment. here money talks and everything else is a far, far second. it you think the situation is very bad now, just wait a few years more when they increase the population by another 2 million. with such an excessively high population density, singapore could well be regarded as the slum of asia. as it is many areas are already infested with rats.

    • Nice to know tht myanmar ranked 32 out of 150 countries.and really nice article.feeling bad for da singapore.

    • reason why I left after 3.5 years...

    • Modern, urban lifestyles are over appreciated and unsustainable, along with suburban developments with large shopping malls and energy guzzling houses and condo projects.

    • I was amused some countries that have extremely repressive regimes are being rated so highly. The reason they have so many available resources is because none of them are being utilized due to the populations there living like serfs in the dark ages.

      I think some people telling others how to live will not be happy unitl a majority of the current world population is wiped out while the remaining are living at subsistance levels while the elite (them) will maintain their current access to modern conveniences and technology.

    • This article is a joke!The author needs to come o Singapore, then travel around Asia and around the world. Our cars are among the youngest in the world as most cars over 5 years are than exported to healthier countries. From young we drank water from the tap. Our water purification company is the best in the world and our mortality rate among the lowest in the world. Average lifespan among the longest. If Bad health means all these; rank us lower!!!

    • I can't help but suspect this study has a socialist agenda to it. The UK has not been self-sufficient in food production for over a century, nor have many other countries.

      "Coming out top on the list were Bolivia, Angola, Namibia, Paraguay and Argentina, even though they may have relatively weaker economies. Researchers say are better prepared to offer future generations the financial, food, water and energy security they require." The countries that will be best prepared will be the countries with the strongest economies, because they will be able to afford to buy food no matter where it comes from. Go to a poor country with high food production per capita and see how well the people eat; not very very good!

      “Piling up ecological deficits is just as concerning as piling up financial deficits.” The study should be less on these statistics and more on explaining how this theory is true.

    • This is kind of ridiculous in the aspects it measures. A small, non-self-sufficient country is bound to rank lowly. It becomes a catch 22 situation when Singapore has to use energy intensive methods to recycle water, since that would also mean the use of imported fuels (that also lower the index).

    • Well of course Singapore would rank low. Their criteria of "sustainability" is based on the amount of resources the country has and the general consumption of resources of the country. Given that we already have close to zero resources in the first place, obviously we'd chalk up a greater deficit than other bigger, more resource-rich countries -___- a thoroughly stupid way of judging the sustainability of a country's consumption seriously...

    • I think they article is skewed in a sense that it ranks countries in order of most natural resources that would still be available to them in the future. Of course Singapore would be listed last considering how little natural resources we have in the first place. Besides the articles is just writing down problems that all Singaporean knows since young and sometimes do lament about.

      Furthermore the author of the article fails to recognise efforts by the government to ensure that we still have water after the treaty expires, and continues to harp on the fact that Singapore's water is bought. Also agriculture where Singapore is concern is different from those traditional method where huge masses of lands (which we obviously don't have) is needed. Research is done to see how to improvise hydroponics and aeroponics to ensure more yield while using less space.

      Although I think Singapore can never be economically healthy, I don't think we are as terrible as the article has stated.

    • You can do that on lraicte sites, some pay per lraicte/views, and other allow an author link. Or you can even set up your own blog/site, and sell affiliate products via the site. Some lraicte sites

    • While I agree with the critics of this article that labeling a sustainability metric as "healthy" or "unhealthy" creates a confusing connotation, I believe the article is accurately explaining risks. The Singapore government has been impressive in its management of water, energy and transport challenges, but don't confuse the attractive standard of living as a sign of security. The point is that, if global supply chains are ever impacted, natural disasters strike, or global energy/water/food prices spike - it will be far more comfortable to live in Argentina than here. By my observations, Singaporean's PR and Expats rely too heavily on the government to provide these comforts, and as a result the grass roots conservation and sustainability efforts are too subdued. Please see this article for what it is... yet another wake up call.

    • Leaders ought to be more farsighted as they cannot count on LKY 's vision alone. think future and start having visions! E.g All housing should have roof farms n solar panels. Expand into the sea on megafloats. All housing estates should have farms rather than gardens. Plant tree farms everywhere , especially hard wood rainforest. All electric transportation , including cars, buses. Recycle everything , including food waste into energy.

    • Right, Myanmar tops the region! With those priorities, some undeveloped kampong will come out on top. Not realistic and not sure how helpful. Switch off all A/C?

    • 70% of all converted lands in the world is due to agriculture, more than 50% of these crops are used to feed the animals we consume.and more that 30% of the water is lost on feeding the animals. so we are directly causing deforestation of 50% of the earth by consuming animals. One cow consumes tonnes of water compared to few litres of water consumed by crops.And singapore is one of the highest consumer of animals. reduce meat consumption to reduce loss of water and resources. USA has realiszed and taking steps Singapore gov also has to look into this point.enforce meatless monday or something like that.WATCH THE MOVE The Earth on youtube for more information how meat kills earth.

    • The only reason foreigners go to Singapore is because the places they are in are either more polluted or no work. Singapore is not an example to follow for the future or for any city , local food and water production require massive quantities of energy , and that comes from fossil fuels , no viable wind or wave energy , or even solar , and excessive use of air conditioning due to the over concreteing and tarmacing of the island , cutting off breezes and raising island temperature . Add to this an excessive population with vehicle and industrial pollution, associated with very high noise levels and pollution from Indonesia on a regular basis , Singapore is a very unecological and unhealthy place .
      And yet , the rich and so called educated flock here , well we have to start asking questions about these people , looks as thought the stories of Singapore being a tax haven and a money laundering centre might be true .
      And yes , Singapore is an unhealthy country judging by eating habits , lack of physical activity , and indoor living style .

    • Seeing the response that Singapore has the youngest car population of most countries , the writer seems to forget that the majority of Singapore vehicles are gas guzzling SUV's or equivalent ( unnecessary in a city) with very old and outdated commercial diesel vehicles . And to see the number of high cost fast cars here is something that is looked down on in most developed countries .
      Sorry to say , Singapore is and will be , no example to follow in the future , the original good ideas of the sidelined politicians were much better than all the current governments ideas , which are based heavily on GDP ( for their bonuses) and have favoured quantity not quality in everything from immigration to building .

    • Singapore doesn't have natural water or any natural resources at all. they highly relying on their so called singapore harbor. it is the main thing which boosted singapore's economy from 1970 to recent times.

      according to Lee Kuan Yew, Thais, Malaysians are lazy people, and he praising the Singaporeans, who trapped in 710 km2..

    • The only thing Governments are worried about are their salaries , bonuses, pensions , which is especially true in SIngapore .
      Seeing the current climate change in many parts of the world , and the lack of rain in SE Asia , I doubt Malaysia will be able to supply Singapore with water in the near future .
      We will see in a decade if Singapore will still be there , without natural resources , even the rich will not stay .

    • The idea that treaties cannot be broken is utopia. If Malaysia , like this year , starts having water problems , then the first thing that will happen is stop supplying water to other countries. Also the current treaties were signed for a certain amount of water , and since then the Singapore population has exploded , so where does the additional water come from . Cities like SIngapore will always have a massive ecological deficit , and it will get worse as water and food prices rise steeply , due to the 30% waste . This waste can often be accredited to food being thrown away because it does not look perfect , this is very obvious in SIngapore

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