IACM conducts survey on students’ eating habits

The Civic and Municipal Affairs Bureau (IACM) is expected to start conducting a survey today concerning the food consumption of Macau’s secondary school students.

The survey, which will be completed by the end of 2018, will record students’ height and weight as well as eating habits. It will interview more than 1,000 students from 12 different schools.

IACM representatives revealed last Friday in a press conference that the survey does not assume that students have bad eating habits. A similar survey targeting all age groups was done in 2013.

“This time, the target [is] secondary school students. It is the first time, it has not been done before,” said Lam Mei Sio, head of the civic education and information department of IACM. 

The survey aims to help IACM build a scientific database regarding Macau’s food consumption.

The results of the survey will be used for a risk evaluation, with a particular focus on the diets of secondary school students.

Ma Kam Keong, a member of the IACM administration council, declared that the government hopes to get to “know what the students eat, and whether these foods are healthy for them.”

During the press conference, IACM representatives discussed the bureau’s planned expansion of the Taipa Waterfront Cycle Track Leisure Area. The construction of the full track started in 2003 across six phases, three of which have been completed.

The construction will be carried out in July and will extend the track south towards the Coloane side, ending at the temporary customs station near Rua Marginal do Concórdia.

The new project will extend the track about 600 meters, resulting in a total track length of 1,700 meters.

The construction will be completed in approximately six months, with the track scheduled to commence operations in the beginning of next year.

Taking into account this project, the three already completed and the remaining two phases, the cycle track will form a coastal corridor around 6,000 meters long.

IACM said it had held discussions with the Environmental Protection Bureau to ensure the projects will not disturb the ecological environment of seasonal birds.

Regarding the two scheduled projects, IACM is still researching methods to design better recreational spaces.