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The quality of Kelulut honey is heavily affected by conventional thermal processing due to the existence of thermolabile compounds. Hence, high-pressure processing (HPP) was employed as an alternative method to minimize any quality deterioration during processing.  HPP was carried out at two different pressures (200 and 600 MPa) with two holding times (5 and 10 minutes) respectively. Thermal processing was also carried out (60 and 90 °C for 10 and 30 minutes) for comparison. After treatment, the changes in antioxidant activity, diastase activity and colour were determined. Increment of antioxidant activity by 3 % was recorded by HPP-treated (600 MPa/10 minutes) compared to thermally-treated. Diastase activity which was used as freshness indicator showed non-significant changes (p>0.05), whereas colour evaluated based on total colour different (TCD) and browning index (BI) showed decrement after HPP. Fortunately, the TCD recorded for HPP was below the range noticeable by human eyes, ranging from 1.5 to 3.0. In conclusion, HPP is better than conventional thermal processing in producing minimally-processed Kelulut honey as evident by the retention of diastase activity, antioxidant activity with increment at 600 MPa/ 10 minutes, and unnoticeable changes in colour. This hence has an implication on post-harvest processing of Kelulut honey.

Introduction: Mobile phone is one of the communication tools that have always mattered in many fields included agriculture. The development of the agriculture sector in the rural area is significant to diminish poverty among farmers. Agricultural activities are known to provide opportunities for employment and generating income in the rural area. Poverty can be reduced through adequate investment and improvement in the agriculture sector. Enhancing the use of mobile phone will empower farmers with relevant agriculture information. Thus, agriculture production and profits as well as farmers' food security and livelihood will increase. Methodology: This study uses a quantitative approach, where an adopted and adapted questionnaire was employed to obtain the data needed. Through purposive sampling, 400 respondents were surveyed. The respondents selected were those who are involved in paddy farming in Selangor. Results: The finding of the study reveals that paddy farmers in Selangor are comfortable using mobile phones in seeking agricultural information. The result for communication apps indicates that WhatsApp is the best choice to get information using a mobile phone as 279 respondents responded they were comfortable using WhatsApp to get and share information through a mobile phone. Whereas, the highest agriculture information the farmers sought are information on pest control, farm safety information, and information on pesticide/weed. Conclusion/Recommendation: Due to the well-received mobile phones usage among farmers, it is recommended that organizations such as the Department of Agriculture and Barat Laut Selangor Integrated Agriculture Development Area (IADA) to improve strategies in distributing information on paddy farming using mobile phones.

This study investigates the role of brand self-relevance in developing brand loyalty on the automotive brand, Honda. Indepth interviews of 34 Honda owners in Malaysia were conducted. Those interviewed were asked on their feelings, experiences and loyalty towards Honda. The study conceptualised a research model combining Dick and Basu's (1994) customer loyalty framework and Sirgy's (1986) self-congruity theory. Results demonstrated there are two main self-relevance factors influencing consumers' brand loyalty, which are product or brand user image congruity and need for self-expression. Specifically, study showed need of self-expression plays a significant role in influencing brand loyalty to portray consumers' ideal, social and ideal-social self-images. Results also reveal brand self-relevance plays a significant role to both behavioural and attitudinal brand loyalty. Results illustrated brand self-relevance plays a more significant role in influencing consumers towards true loyalty than latent, spurious or no loyalty. This study suggests brand managers, advertisers and companies should focus on brand self-relevance in developing brand loyalty strategies to capture brand's target market and retain them for a long duration of time. Findings provide a more specific direction in developing brand communication strategies and marketing plans to create strong and sustainable brand, retaining greater brand loyalty of the customers.

In the recent years, the advancement of social media plays a phenomenal role in the Malaysia's media and academic landscape. Social media have garnered massive adoption among the online population, paving way for scholars to understand on the usage and impact of social media on the users in the country. The rising amount of research on social media illustrates a growing interest in this phenomenon. Despite the budding interest among scholars, the understanding on the research patterns and status on social media studies in Malaysia is still inadequate, comparing with the research trends analyses in the West. This paper investigated the trends of social media research in Malaysia from 2004 to 2015. A quantitative content analysis was conducted on 79 articles in 21 selected academic journals in identifying the methodological approach, theoretical application, topical, social media type, type of content and research developmental phases of social media scholarship. Findings revealed social media research in Malaysia is still in formative stage but increasing throughout the years. Unlike findings from past analyses, theory-driven articles in Malaysia were more prevalent than theoretical presence in the West. Nonetheless, Malaysian scholars still lack in conceptualisation and expansion of theories. The study suggests for a more explicit theoretical foundation and technology advancement in the future research. This study also suggests that future scholarly endeavours should have better methodological rigour and wider dispersion of social media medium and content type.

Sesame crackers (Kuih Bijan), a Malay popular traditional snack in Malaysia, is produced by deep frying sesame coated dough balls that are made from glutinous rice flour, sugar and water as the main ingredients. In this paper, the effect of different frying temperature (150, 170 and 190°C) and frying time (0, 1, 3, 5, and 7 min) on colour change of the uncoated sesame cracker's dough balls using electrical deep-fryer was investigated. The results showed that the mean values of redness (a*), yellowness (b*), chroma (C*), browning index (BI) and total colour change (ΔE) were found to increase significantly (P<0.05) with elevating frying temperature and frying time as shown in 170 and 190°C. However, the change of all these parameters is less significant at 150°C.

This study examines the types of product placements used in the television show Gegar Vaganza, particularly in its 5th season and looks at the consumer perceptions on the product placements used by D’Herbs Holdings Sdn. Bhd. Qualitative content analysis and in-depth interviews were conducted on eight respondents. The saturation of advertisements in the market has prompted marketers to turn to media product placement to deliver messages to the audiences more effectively. This study found that integrated implicit product placement received positive feedback on the process of recalling a brand or product. On the other hand, integrated explicit placements received positive perceptions in increasing the level of consumer information, however, received negative perceptions towards consumer purchasing intentions.

The global impact of COVID-19 has been devastating. The grim mantra of new norm repeated the world over indicates that COVID-19, unlike previous disasters, negates the possibility of bouncing back. As such, we need to rethink how we conceptualize community resilience, moving away from the nostalgic ideas of bounce back, and embracing the notion of bounce forward. Indeed, humans have bounced back from seven coronaviruses in the likes of common colds, and the SARS and MERS pandemics. The COVID-19 pandemic, however, spreads much faster than past pandemics and brings paradigmatic changes with widespread effects pervading various facets of life, from the social to the economic aspects. Past preparations had mainly focused on stopping transmission and largely neglected the socio-economics repercussions. In this paper, communication is proposed to play a central role in fostering community resilience in the bounce-forward notion in pandemics. The roles of communication in the long-term stability and viability of communities, in the bounce-forward notion, has been understudied. In addition to disseminating information and creating awareness, communication can also act as a vital enabler to break down silos, share knowledge, ensure equitable access, and foster vertical and horizontal, top-down and bottom-up working relationships. More needs to be explained on the centrality of communication in capacity building, adaptation to new realities and seizing opportunities that the current media and communication landscapes have to offer. Pandemics will be our new normal, thus, we need to gear up, to avoid the 'coronacoma' that we are experiencing with COVID-19.