What's News: January 30, 2018

Customers may have to pay a deposit for using food trays at up to 25 hawker centres in the coming years. This automated system, in use at Marsiling Mall Hawker Centre and Bukit Merah Hawker Centre, charges 50 cents and $1, respectively, for the deposit.

Singapore Airlines will be tapping digital technology in many ways under a three-year masterplan - from boosting customer service to aircraft maintenance. For example, it will use data analytics to better understand customers' preferences and travel patterns. It will also develop a way to predict when aircraft parts need to be fixed.

Malaysia's highest court declared yesterday that the consent of both parents is needed to change a child's religion, voiding the unilateral conversion of Hindu M. Indira Gandhi's children by her Muslim ex-husband. The ruling has drawn a line under a debate over whether a Muslim parent can convert a child without the consent of a non-Muslim spouse.

US President Donald Trump's national security team is looking at options to counter the threat of China spying on US phone calls, including building a super-fast 5G wireless network, a senior administration official has said. The official said the option is now being debated at a low level in the administration.

Singapore has to view its scarce environmental reserves the way it views fiscal reserves - as something valuable to be conserved and protected, says environmentalist Geh Min.

Study awards including sponsorships by firms in the construction industry were given out yesterday in a bid to attract young people to the sector. The Government said there will also be awards to help current employees upgrade their skills.

The firm that used to run The Online Citizen has failed in its appeal to overturn an order for it to return $5,000 in advertising revenue.It said yesterday it had returned the money it took from a British company linked to Singapore fugitive Tan Wah Piow.

Singapore investors large and small ploughed record amounts of money into real estate overseas last year. Around US$28.4 billion (S$37.2 billion) was outlaid - up 40 per cent on the US$20.4 billion spent in 2016. It also upended the old record of US$27.6 billion set in 2015.

The Football Association of Singapore (FAS) has announced that it will work closely with private football academies here to unearth young talent. The FAS will roll out an Under-14 league, featuring private academy teams as well as youth sides from S-League clubs. The national body also plans to make it mandatory for all private academy coaches to have the minimum C Licence coaching badge.

Bloodthirsty pirates and runaway concubines are some of the colourful characters in The Singapore Saga, an ambitious new series of novels that will span a hundred years of the Republic's early history. The first volume in the series, by Scottish professor John D. Greenwood, comes out ahead of Singapore's bicentennial celebrations next year.

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Straits Times Digital

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