Category: News

According to a new study that was published in the the Lancet medical journal, the world is getting fatter. Since the study first started back in 1980 the largest increase in the rate of obesity were in Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Oman, Honduras, and Bahrain for women, and in New Zealand, Bahrain, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, and the USA for men. I downloaded the PDF of the study and I’ve put together a top 10 list of the highest obesity rates in the world:

Obese Girls < 20 Years
1- Kiribati 36%
2- Federated States of Micronesia 32.4%
3- Samoa 29.6%
4- Kuwait 23.3%
5- Libya 22.1%
6- The Bahamas 20.2%
7- Uruguay 18.1%
8- Soloman Islands 18.0%
9- Qatar 15.5%
10- Syria 15.4%

Obese Boys < 20 Years
1- Samoa 23.7%
2- Kiribati 22.9%
3- Qatar 18.8%
4- Kuwait 16.7%
5- The Bahamas 15.9%
5- Lebanon 15.9%
7- Libya 14.5%
8- Federated States of Micronesia 14.5%
9- Syria 13.9%
10- Israel 13.9%

Obese Women ≥ 20 Years
1- Samoa 69.1%
2- Tonga 67.2%
3- Kuwait 58.6%
4- Federated States of Micronesia 57.9%
5- Libya 57.2%
6- Kiribati 55.5%
7- Qatar 54.7%
9- Marshall Islands 49.1%
10- Egypt 48.4%

Obese Men ≥ 20 Years
1- Tonga 52.4%
2- Samoa 45.9%
3- Qatar 44.0%
4- Kuwait 43.4%
5- Kiribati 39.3%
6- Marshall Islands 31.9%
7- USA 31.7%
9- Federated States of Micronesia 31.3%
10- The Bahamas 30.9%

Sadly Kuwait made it into the top 5 of every list. Although no countries had significant decreases in obesity, I would be interested to see if Kuwait’s obesity rate has at least slowed down over the past few years. Everyone is generally more health conscious today than they were a few years ago (me included) and there are a lot more gyms and healthy food options available now as well. You can download the full study from [Here] (signup required)

There’s an article on KUNA’s website on Kuwait’s nine islands and about how they’re very important to Kuwait culturally. Near the end of the article this following paragraph caught my attention:

The committee aims at declaring the islands as reserve areas, where entry procedures would be arranged in coordination with bodies concerned in the country such as Kuwait Environment Protection Society (KEPS), Kuwait University (KU), Cabinet’s security decisions’ follow-up committee, Public Authority for Agriculture Affairs and Fish Resources (PAAFR), Ministry of Transpirations, Ministry of Interior, Ministry of Defense, Kuwait Institute for Scientific Research (KISR), and Kuwait Volunteer Work Center, added Al-Enezi.

If the Kuwaiti islands all get declared as natural reserves then no one will be able to go there without permission and basically killing Kubbar as a weekend getaway hotspot. Not sure what happens to Failaka, they might just restrict access to certain parts of the island. Check out the full article on KUNA’s website [Here]

On a side note has the quality of the English on the KUNA website gone down recently or has it always been this bad? The last two articles I’ve read there have just been terribly written as if they were translated with Google first before being edited.

Photo by Mike Cockcroft

According to an index compiled by Bloomberg, Kuwait is amongst the most expensive markets for hotel rooms coming in third place behind Geneva and Dubai. The reason behind the high prices is mostly likely because land is so expensive in Kuwait and the fact that there are a limited number of hotels. Still, it would feel pretty odd to pay so much more for a hotel here than one in London, New York or Miami. Check out the article [Here]

Over the weekend a video went viral showing an endangered sea turtle being killed on a beach in Kuwait. In the very graphic video (which I won’t share on this blog), one man is seen sitting on top of the large turtle with a small kitchen knife in his hand while his family and friends can be heard in the background encouraging him to cut off the turtles head. You can even hear a voice of a woman and a child in the video, both in support of the killing. Once the perpetrator starts cutting off the turtles head, a second man comes into the video frame to help hold the turtle down. Once the head is cut off the child in the background yells out that he wants the head while everyone else watches the now dead and decapitated turtle bleed on the beach.

The Environment Public Authority (EPA) is now offering a KD3,000 reward to anyone who can identify the people in the video. It’s a very horrific crime but animal abuse sadly isn’t very rare in Kuwait. Last year some guys were driving around with shotguns shooting and decapitating stray dogs and then posting pictures all over Instagram and they were never punished so I am hoping this time around the perpetrators will be punished and made an example of.

Most of the articles on the sea turtle killing are in Arabic but KUNA have a poorly written piece on it which you could read [Here]

Yarmouk became the first healthy city in Kuwait this month by fulfilling the requirements of the World Health Organization (WHO). Some of the requirements they fulfilled included:

– Fighting against obesity
– Having a walk marathon
– Beautification and cleaning of the city
– Setting up a well-equipped walking track
– Planted trees
– Saved power and water
– Washed streets with water and soap
– Organized exhibitions for young entrepreneurs a
– Established an environment-friendly park
– Organized cultural, social, educational and health symposiums and lectures
– Urged people to donate blood
– Combatted smoking
– Fighting swine flu

I think thats really great now if only the same formula could be applied to my area or other areas around Kuwait. Checkout the article on KUNA [Here]

Photo by Samira

Kuwait is expecting unwelcomed guests next week – swarms of desert locusts are set to arrive to the country due to climate change and increased temperature, a veteran meteorologist said. The swarms are expected to be considerably large compared to recent years, according to forecasts by “some environmental and agricultural groups”, said Dr Saleh Al-Ojairi in a statement Monday. [Source]

Deep-fried locust anyone?

According to @watannews the power went out at the Kuwait Airport earlier today. According to rumors I’ve heard the backup generators also ended up failing. Doesn’t look like any flights were affected though.

Former MP Mohammad Hayef has accused an unidentified lawyer of devil worship after the latter stuck pictures and hung dummies of scary characters outside his house in Jabriya area as part of his child’s birthday celebrations.

According to sources, when former MP Mohammad Hayef alerted Jabriya Police Station about some people worshipping the devil inside the house, police officers rushed to the house to discover the residents were celebrating a child’s birthday. They demanded the owner of the house, who is a lawyer, to remove the pictures and dummies.

The lawyer expressed surprise over the reaction of the former lawmaker, affirming that he will sue Hayef over the issue especially since the pictures of his house has been circulating on social networking websites as a center for devil worship. [Source]

I love the local news.

Sources quoted by the Kuwait Times said the two-day operation carried out Sunday covered four warehouses owned by a single company, with items seized including meat products, fish, poultry and other ingredients. [Source]

Why doesn’t the local media mention which company and what the product brands are? Shouldn’t they warn people who might have already purchased the products?

Photo from ArabianBusiness

Jazeera Airways said on Monday it is in the final stages of launching a dedicated gates facility at Kuwait International Airport.

The airline said in a statement that its investment in Kuwait Airport will lift the airport’s gates capacity by 30 percent and will offer a “better, easier, and more streamlined boarding experience for customers”. [Source]

Originally I remember reading that they were going to have their own dedicated terminal but I guess that didn’t work out and they’re now going to have dedicated gates instead.

Six Flags Entertainment Corporation, the world’s largest regional theme park company, and Meraas Leisure and Entertainment, have announced plans to bring a theme park to Dubai.

In a joint statement, the companies said a new strategic partnership will bring a Six Flags-branded theme park to the emirate. The project is planned to open in late 2017 and will be located within the multi-themed park project in Jebel Ali launched by Meraas.

I’m jealous. [Link]

According to an article published on Interactive Travel, the new Kuwait Airways planes that will start arriving at the end of the year will allow you to use your mobile phone during flight as well as connect online via WiFi.

The airline has ordered five A330s and seven A320s, all of which will be line fitted with Mobile OnAir and Internet OnAir. The first A320 and first A330 will be delivered in December 2014 and May 2015.

If this actually happens I might start flying Kuwait Airways again. [Link]

The airline’s first female CEO, who took control in December, said eventually she would like to reduce staff numbers even further.
“My target is 4,500 but I can’t do that this year,” she said.

The airline is undergoing a major restructure after two decades of being burdened with old, inefficient aircraft, staff protectionism and a bloated workforce of 6,000.

I want to be optimistic but I find it hard to believe they’ll fire 1,000 government employees. [Link]

Update: Nevermind, I missed the line that said all the employees they are going to fire are foreigners. Now it makes sense.

Short report by the BBC on Saad Lamjarred’s visit to Al Hamra Mall a few days ago. [Link]

Reuters have an interesting article today on why Kuwait is falling behind.

When Shawaf al-Shawaf wanted to register his kitchen tools business in Kuwait, the bureaucratic process took six months. In Saudi Arabia, it took him less than a day.

“If I need to go to a government department, I cancel my whole day because I know I will spend the whole time there,” said Shawaf, 24, who set up his company Dolsten in late 2012.

A 2013 World Bank ranking on the ease of doing business puts Kuwait at 104 out of 189 economies, by far the lowest in the GCC. The next lowest, Qatar, is at 48 while Saudi Arabia is at 26 and the UAE leads at 23.

I don’t think its just Kuwaitis who are asking, everyone is. Here is a link to the [Article]

Thanks Ahmed