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1 month ago | 
thestar.com.my | Hazlin Hassan |Stania Puspawardhani |Fatimah Mujibah
KUALA LUMPUR/JAKARTA/SINGAPORE: For months, 19-year-old Noah (not his real name) from Malaysia had been researching how to study marine biology in the United States: Looking into visa rules, work opportunities and internships. But in April, he gave up on his dream. “I had my heart set on Hawaii – some people call it the Disneyland for marine scientists,” he told The Straits Times.
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1 month ago | 
thestar.com.my | Hazlin Hassan |Stania Puspawardhani |Fatimah Mujibah
KUALA LUMPUR/JAKARTA/SINGAPORE: For months, 19-year-old Noah (not his real name) from Malaysia had been researching how to study marine biology in the United States: looking into visa rules, work opportunities and internships. But in April, he gave up on his dream. “I had my heart set on Hawaii – some people call it the Disneyland for marine scientists,” he told The Straits Times.
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1 month ago | 
straitstimes.com | Hazlin Hassan |Stania Puspawardhani |Fatimah Mujibah
KUALA LUMPUR/JAKARTA/SINGAPORE – For months, 19-year-old Noah (not his real name) from Malaysia had been researching how to study marine biology in the United States: looking into visa rules, work opportunities and internships. But in April, he gave up on his dream. “I had my heart set on Hawaii – some people call it the Disneyland for marine scientists,” he told The Straits Times.
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1 month ago | 
straitstimes.com | Philip Wen |Lu Wei Hoong |Stania Puspawardhani |Joyce Lim
BANGKOK - Factory workers in Muar, known for its abundant high-quality rubberwood sourced from end-of-life-cycle rubber plantations, are working speedily to polish ready-to-assemble furniture pieces and arranging them into flat-pack boxes. The hive of activity in the coastal town in north-western Johor, Malaysia’s biggest furniture manufacturing hub, belies the confluence of pain points that are contributing to an undercurrent of foreboding and gloom.
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1 month ago | 
straitstimes.com | Stania Puspawardhani
JAKARTA - Whoosh. Clank. The steady rhythm of printing presses once echoed through the vast recesses of Jakarta’s Dutch colonial-era money-printing factory, redolent of ink and paper, history and tradition. Fast forward to today, and the soundscape has shifted: Laughter spills from cosy cafes, lively chatter buzzes as shoppers dart in and out of boutiques, and the sound of music draws curious onlookers to the courtyard space as local band members tune their instruments before a performance.
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2 months ago | 
straitstimes.com | Stania Puspawardhani
JAKARTA – Mr Andri Prihatin has been patiently unloading rice sacks and bottled water in the past week at a neighbourhood grocery store in Jakarta, leaving behind his wife and two toddlers nearly 300km away, in search of a better life for his family. The former worker at a tofu factory in Tegal in Central Java province aims to find a permanent job as a shop assistant, and perhaps further down the road, open a roadside stall selling fried catfish.
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2 months ago | 
straitstimes.com | Joyce Lim |Shannon Teoh |Debarshi Dasgupta |Stania Puspawardhani
Chinese toy exporter fears that US orders would ‘shrivel up’ this yearSHENZHEN –Boxes of colourful toy tool sets which should have been bound for toddlers in the United States sit unclaimed in Ms Cece Wong’s Guangdong warehouse. The rapidly spiralling tariff war, which has given some American importers pause about purchases from China, has left exporters like her in limbo.
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2 months ago | 
thestar.com.my | Philip Wen |Shannon Teoh |Stania Puspawardhani
BANGKOK: Vietnam produces about half of sporting giant Nike’s shoes, hosts an Intel chip assembly plant, and is a major hub for the production of Apple’s watches and AirPods. Major apparel retailers Abercrombie & Fitch and Lululemon rely heavily on both Vietnam and Cambodia for their production. And electric carmaker Tesla signed a US$5 billion (S$6.7 billion) deal in 2022 to source nickel from Indonesia for its e-vehicle production.
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2 months ago | 
straitstimes.com | Philip Wen |Shannon Teoh |Stania Puspawardhani
BANGKOK – Vietnam produces about half of sporting giant Nike’s shoes, hosts an Intel chip assembly plant, and is a major hub for the production of Apple’s watches and AirPods. Major apparel retailers Abercrombie & Fitch and Lululemon rely heavily on both Vietnam and Cambodia for their production. And electric car maker Tesla signed a US$5 billion (S$6.7 billion) deal in 2022 to source nickel from Indonesia for its e-vehicle production.
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Mar 28, 2025 | 
straitstimes.com | Stania Puspawardhani
JAKARTA – Mr Oksand, a 40-year-old corporate manager from Bogor, West Java, will not be flying back to his family’s home town in Payakumbuh, West Sumatra, for Hari Raya Aidilfitri, which is expected to fall on March 31 this year. “The ticket prices have surged to almost double the normal price during Ramadan, and as Hari Raya approaches, it’s almost triple,” he lamented. Join ST's Telegram channel and get the latest breaking news delivered to you.
