Malaysia’s No. 1 coating solutions provider, Nippon
Paint Malaysia Group (“Nippon Paint”) officially launched its Child Wellness Programme, an educational campaign aimed to empower today’s
discerning parents and key decision makers towards creating uplifting
environments for children, through various awareness and educational
initiatives related to children’s health and wellness.
The Child Wellness Programme sees partnerships with national associations such as
the Malaysian Paediatric Association (MPA), the Malaysian Society of Allergy
and Immunology (MSAI), Persatuan Pengasuh Berdaftar Malaysia (PPBM) as well as
Persatuan Tadika Malaysia (PTM), working alongside medical practitioners and
child care providers as key influencers to provide simple steps and
expert advises for today’s discerning parents.
The
Child Wellness Programme stems from Nippon Paint’s introduction of Malaysia’s
first Child Wellness Range, a series of functional coatings that
focuses on enabling clean air, safe touch and creativity in 3 key growth
milestones respectively – infants, toddlers and children. Its paint solutions
are water-based, lead and mercury free with low Volatile Organic Compound (VOC)
as well as Total Volatile Organic Compound (TVOC) emissions, which is safe for
the environment as well as indoor spaces.
The
Child Wellness Range leverages on
the Active Carbon Technology which is
designed to absorb harmful formaldehyde from the air, converting them into
water vapour for cleaner air. Its range of solutions also contains the Silver Ion Technology that are able to
mitigate the growth of viruses and bacteria from spreading through walls,
effective against Influenza A (H1N1) and Coxsackievirus A16,
which causes Hand Foot and Mouth Disease as well as other types of bacteria
such as E. Coli, MRSA, and Staphylococcus Aureus. The range also includes Anti-Stain Technology, allowing parents
the ease of mind for their children to express creativity because stains can be
easily cleaned.
Speaking at the launch of the Child Wellness Programme, Gladys
Goh, Group General Manager of Nippon Paint Malaysia Group said, “Innovation
has always been in Nippon Paint’s DNA. In fact, we continuously listen to our
consumers’ changing needs and realised that there is an untapped opportunity
within the paint industry. That motivated us to develop a child-friendly range
of coatings that allows us to create a safer, healthier indoor environment for
young children. And while doing so, we are also rolling out the Child Wellness
Programme in collaboration with various national associations to undertake
awareness and education programmes to reach out to parents, child care centres
and kindergarten owners and operators and the community in terms of provision
of expert advice and information for them to make informed decisions regarding
their children’s health and wellness.”
The launch event was graced by Prof Datuk
Dr Mohd Sham Kasim, Past President of Malaysian
Paediatric Association (MPA) and Former Secretary General of Asia Pacific
Paediatric Association (APPA); Dr Amir Hamzah Dato’ Abd Latiff, President of
Malaysian Society of Allergy & Immunology (MSAI); Ms Norsheila
Abdullah, President of Persatuan Pengasuh Berdaftar Malaysia (PPBM) and
Ms Eveleen Ling, President of Persatuan Tadika Malaysia (PTM).
Speaking
at a panel discussion session after the official launch, Dr Amir Hamzah explained,
"With easy access to information via the internet, many parents today
are equipped with their own 'digital doctor', by surfing on various websites to
check on their children's symptoms and treatment options. However, this may
result in misdiagnosing as there are many symptoms that may appear similar to
various conditions. In addition to that, it may be challenging to verify the
authenticity or credibility of the information provided. Thus, the Malaysian
Society of Allergy and Immunology (MSAI) is pleased to collaborate with Nippon
Paint on the Child Wellness Programme to provide expert advice to parents and
key decision makers.”
Under
the Child Wellness Programme, the partnership with MPA will see collaborative
efforts in public outreach through seeding of expert and educational content, engagements
with medical experts as well as roundtable sessions as provision of first line
of advice to parents.
While
Nippon Paint is collaborating with MSAI to highlight key information to raise
awareness on indoor allergens in health-related issues via a web series on
Nippon Paint’s Facebook platform and other engagements such as Facebook Live
clinics, expert speaker series and expert roundtable sessions.
As
part of the Child Wellness Programme, Nippon Paint will also play a vital role
as an advisory panellist for both PPBM and PTM, participating in training
sessions, workshops to educate child care providers, kindergarten operators on
the importance of indoor environment for children. Nippon Paint will also
provide advisory services on selection of colours and kids-safe coatings from
its Child Wellness Range to facilitate an uplifting and safer indoor
environment for children.
In partnering with various associations on the Child Wellness Programme, Goh concluded, “Indeed, it is
alarming to know that Malaysians are still at high risk for many health-related
issues, especially amongst young children. As a total coatings expert with 50
years of presence in Malaysia, we have since grown in leaps and bounds and
today we have come a long way to be where we are today. Thus, our strategy is
to provide functional coatings that provides parents the peace of mind for
safer indoor environment for their children.”
According
to Malaysian Society of Allergy and Immunology, one out of three Malaysians
suffer from some form of allergy, children from parents with allergies also
stand a 50-80% chance of developing an allergy. Parents and child care
providers may lack relevant knowledge on the importance of the role a conducive
indoor environment plays for the development of children.
At
a young age, infants spend most of their time in the crib breathing in twice
the amount of air as compared to an adult. Thus, indoor air quality should not
be taken lightly as infants spend up to 8-20 hours a day indoors.
This
is fact and most of us do not realized including mouse mommy. That is the
reason indoor air quality plays an important role for the whole family well-being.
As
babies continue to grow and make their way into toddlerhood, children at this
age develop the sense of curiosity in which, crawling, flipping over, touch,
bite, feel would come into place. The potential of indoor health risks then
increases as children are now exposed to various surfaces such as walls and
floors that may contain viruses and bacteria.
Children
below the age of 5 are the most vulnerable to viruses and bacteria such as
HFMD. With diseases like HFMD and H1N1 that were endemic in Malaysia, there is
a need to seed out relevant information to educate parents and child care
providers on the importance of indoor environment as children spend most of
their time either in a day care centre, school or at home.
Creativity
through play is essential for the child’s mental and physical development as it
helps to enhance cognitive skills as well as self-worth and self-esteem values.
Safe indoor environment should be a priority for all, however, parents and
child care providers should also look into ways to provide an uplifting,
conducive environment to encourage creativity. 20% of Malaysian children suffer
from stress and anxiety due to stifling of play as most parents or caretakers
provide restricted access to the type of play avoiding some “forbidden” plays
such as scribbling on walls.
Yes!
Mouse mommy also interested in Nippon Paint Child Wellness Range as in I have two little creative artists at home. Mouse mommy does
purposely bought them the white board wall stick and told them Only allow to craft their
story on it. But, kids’ imagination always “beyond” the white board “box”, MR
and MH not only draw on the white board wall pieces, but beyond the limitation and
love to express themselves on our house’s wall itself too.
MR
loves to do his mathematics calculation and drawing on the wall to express
his creativity while the little baby MH loves to imitate his brother MR to ‘draft’ his
artwork too! LOL!
Mouse mommy really grateful to have Nippon Paint Child Wellness Range come to help to ease my trouble. Mouse mommy can just wipe it off, hmm... maybe could ask MR help to do the cleaning task too. Mouse mommy feeling happy and my kids also getting excited too to let their creativity glows!
