In the past few years, I have received numerous complaints from residents who live to the immediate north of the Riverside recycling centre and composting operation about the extent of the bad smell coming from the operation from time to time.I have ra… read more
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Mr. Anthony Lake, executive director of UNICEF, talks about cognitive capital in Beijing on May 16, 2017. [Photo by Li Xiaohua/China.org.cn] |
Investing in high-quality interventions that promote optimal brain development during a child’s formative years not only benefits the individual, but can bring enormous dividends to the future growth and prosperity of a country like China, Mr. Anthony Lake, executive director of UNICEF, declared in Beijing on May 16.
He made these remarks at a media interaction session on the sidelines of a consultation meeting discussing how social and financial investments raising cognitive capital – the capacity of people to think and learn and work together –will help sustain and grow the economies of the future.
Interventions in childhood are proven to have high rates of social, economic, and environmental returns. Statistics from the Copenhagen Consensus Center (2017) show that for every U.S. dollar invested in reducing malnutrition and promoting immunization, the returns are approximately US$45 and US$60, respectively.
Investing in breastfeeding may increase world gross national income by at least 0.49 percent or US$302 billion per year, leading to improvements in IQ, and leave no environmental footprint unlike formula feeding.
Dr. Martin Burt, founder and CEO of Fundación Paraguaya, emphasized raising awareness of the importance of the breastfeeding among mothers. “Mothers face conflicting pressures because of tiredness, nervousness and stress; only if she understands the importance of breastfeeding, will she not give formula bottles to babies,” he noted.
Mr. Lake also stressed the word needed to be spread in the community and among parents to “feed your child well, to play with your child and to protect the child from violence. None of these things cost very much, but all will add greatly to the future ability of the child, for the child to be healthy, to think clearly and to earn more, and that in turn benefits the whole society.
“This is especially important for poor children, because if they don’t get the same care and attention as well off ones, when they grow up, society will be divided by the different cognitive capacities between the poor and the well off,” he added.
read moreAbout 73.5 percent of surveyed people said that they received paid annual leave, while 21.9 percent people said they did not have paid days off. The survey, conducted among 1,997 employers, was published in Tuesday’s edition of the China Youth Daily. … read more
HOST: Welcome to our studio Prime Minister, take a seat. PRIME MINISTER: How are you? HOST: Very well. Do you have your phone with you, were you tweeting on the way in? PRIME MINISTER: (Laughter) No not so much, I’ve … read more
The main issues that have dominated in Wokingham Borough in recent years are all related to one thing – the fast growth rate in new homes and in the numbers of people living in our community. Wokingham is a welcoming place to newcomers. Some growth is helpful to all. The problems occur if the growth is too sudden or too large.
It leads to strains on roads, public transport, NHS facilities, school places and other parts of our infrastructure.
The Council has difficult decisions to make about when and how to expand their local services. Put in school places too early, and the bills go up. Established schools lose pupils and money as the new schools open. Forest has lost pupil numbers thanks to the opening of the new Bohunt school.Leave it too late, and there are insufficient places. There is a scramble to find somewhere in the area, with longer travel times for pupils and a strain on school resources.
We are short of space on the roads, and up against limits on some public transport. I worked away to get a new station at Wokingham. Reading station has now been given much needed extra train capacity. Crossrail will soon provide a better service into central and east London. The Council is building the Shinfield, Arborfield and Winnersh by passes, and putting in two new link roads and a new railway bridge in Wokingham. The sooner this is done the better. The roadworks themselves compound difficulties, and current capacity is far below what is needed.
The government is promising some control over the pace of welcoming new migrants to the UK in future.I wish to work with the Council to come up with a fairer number of new homes the area can take to persuade the government we need a sustainable and realistic growth figure. The Council and MP in the next Parliament also need to make common cause and to put enough investment in so the developments improve the provision of transport and public service.
We need to keep enough green spaces and areas to absorb water run off, as too much development increases flood risk and removes too many countryside areas. We also wish to keep green spaces and gaps between settlements to keep the best of our local landscape.
Promoted and published by Fraser Mc Farland on behalf of John Redwood, both of 30 Rose Street Wokingham RG40 1XU
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