Nuclear Technology Useful In Everyday Life

GEORGE TOWN (Malaysia), Sept 22 (Bernama) -- Nuclear technology is needed as it is actually very useful in everyday life but the public's understanding of it is still rudimentary while perception only links the technology to explosives. Malaysian Nuclear Agency (ANM) director-general Dr Abdul Rahim Harun said based on a study conducted by the agency, nuclear technology was useful and important in health, agriculture and manufacturing sectors. "It is true that the public's perception when it hears ‘nuclear’, is that it is related to dangerous material like bombs, nuclear weapons and evokes fear but actually nuclear technology can benefit society immensely. "That is why we are constantly running awareness programmes on nuclear technology to the community so that it knows precisely what it is and presently, we see the community’s perception improving as we are always highlighting its benefits. "For example, one of the nuclear technologies we have developed in agriculture is that we produced a IS21 mutant rice variety that is now being used by more than 30,000 farmers since its launch in November last year," he said after opening an International Conference on Non-ionising Radiation (NIR) here today. The two-day conference until tomorrow is a platform to present the latest information directly from the policy experts and inventors on standards whereby 19 papers will be presented. Meanwhile, Abdul Rahim said the agency was collaborating with the Ministry of Education (MoE) to develop a syllabus for primary school to higher education that focused on the uses of nuclear technology. He said the collaboration was to expose students who will be provided with an appropriate syllabus to explain the role of nuclear technology in everyday life. "So far, it has been taught in schools, such as radiation of nuclear usage in various fields of manufacturing, medicine and agriculture and we as a nuclear agency are used as a reference to increasing knowledge on the technology in school syllabus and also higher level learning. "Except that in schools, there is no specific subject on nuclear (science) and it is only an annex to the physics subject while the nuclear syllabus is essentially basic exposure to primary school students," he said. -- BERNAMA