Carrying Seeds from the University of London
How One of the Earliest Southeast Asian Cohorts Helped Build the Nutrition Profession Across Malaysia, hopefully in Singapore and Beyond
A personal memoir of Queen Elizabeth College, Professor John Yudkin, IMR, SIRIM, the Nutrition Society of Malaysia, and a lifetime devoted to public health.
Queen Elizabeth College, University of London—the birthplace of modern academic nutrition for one of Southeast Asia's earliest university-trained nutritionists.
Some Journeys Begin with a Passport
Some journeys begin with a passport.
Others begin with a seed.
Mine began at Queen Elizabeth College (QEC), University of London, where Professor John Yudkin trained one of the world's earliest generations of academically qualified nutritionists.
He held a string highly admirable academic and professional degrees
1. BSc: Bachelor of Science from London (1929)
2. BA & MA: Bachelor of Arts (1931) and Master of Arts (1934) from Cambridge
3. PhD: Doctor of Philosophy from Cambridge (1935) in biochemistry
4. MB BChir: Bachelor of Medicine and Surgery (1938), University of London
5. MD: Doctor of Medicine (1943) from University of Cambridge
He was not just a very world-renown nutritionist, but the Chair of Physiology first at QEC before he became the Chair of Nutrition later. He was not just an ordinary doctor, but a medical specialist, a chemist and a biologist
Looking back after more than half a century, I realise that we were not simply students. We were carrying seeds—seeds of science, public health and professional nutrition—that would later take root in Malaysia, Singapore and beyond.
What began as an overseas scholarship eventually became a lifetime devoted to building institutions, shaping standards, and protecting public health.
When Nutrition Had No Profession
It is difficult for young nutritionists today to imagine the world we returned to in the 1960s.
Food manufacturers could add preservatives, colourings and flavourings with few controls. Health claims appeared on labels with little scientific scrutiny. People attended short hotel courses and called themselves nutritionists. Chemists often performed work that today belongs to food microbiologists and food quality controllers trained in multi-disciplinary of science, while dietitians were frequently asked to function as nutritionists because no formally trained specialists existed.
Nutrition had not yet become a recognised profession.
That was the world awaiting us when we returned home.
A Remarkable Classroom in London
Under Professor John Yudkin, Queen Elizabeth College pioneered the academic study of human nutrition by integrating biochemistry, physiology, public health, food science among other areas.
Our education extended beyond university lectures. Since Prof John Yudkin was also a specialist physician, we were thoroughly drilled in clinical nutrition how to recognize and diagnose nutritional deficiency diseases and how to conduct differential diagnosis from other diseases. For that we also attended teaching sessions and clinical observations in several London hospitals, where we studied nutritional deficiency diseases as they presented in real patients. Conditions such as kwashiorkor, marasmus, rickets, pellagra, scurvy and anaemia were not merely textbook descriptions—they became living lessons that linked laboratory science with clinical medicine.
Those clinical teaching sessions were augmented with slides taken from clinical cases in Yemen and certain African countries. Very few universities in the world that could do that. Those hospital experiences helped shape my conviction that nutrition was never simply about food. It was about preventing human suffering.
In our small postgraduate class during the 1960s were four students who would later carry that knowledge across Southeast Asia.
The first four formally qualified nutritionists were:
1. The Late Professor Dr Jason S. T. Teoh (Malaysia) — later Dean of the Faculty of Medicine, University of Malaya. He studied at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine that ran the same parallel course by the University of London under Professor Dr Benjamin Stanley Platt
4. A young woman from Thailand — the daughter of the Thai Ambassador to the United Kingdom, representing another early pioneer of nutrition in Thailand.
Together, we represented one of the earliest Southeast Asian cohorts trained in this academic tradition.
Professor Jason Teoh and I became the first two Malaysians to obtain formal postgraduate qualifications in Nutrition from the University of London.
None of us imagined then that our classroom would become the starting point of a regional story.
Returning Home to Build Something That Did Not Yet Exist
When I joined the Institute for Medical Research (IMR), I entered an institution already rich with dedicated scientists.
Dr Chong Yoon Hin headed the Division of Nutrition at IMR as a distinguished biochemist with a PhD from the University of London. Mrs Ruth Lim served as Nutrition Officer after being seconded from Kuala Lumpur General Hospital as a dietitian.
Both made invaluable contributions.
Yet there was still no officer whose formal postgraduate qualification was specifically in Nutrition.
To the best of my knowledge, I became the first officer appointed to IMR with a formal postgraduate qualification in Nutrition from the University of London, working alongside Dr Chong - as nutrition research began taking a more specialised scientific direction.
Research Before Recognition
Our work extended across many fields of health research.
We conducted some of Malaysia's early nutrition surveys, analysed the nutrient composition of Malaysian foods, investigated community health problems, and contributed scientific evidence that would later shape national policy.
Those laboratory results did not remain inside journals.
They became foundations for public health.
Building Food Standards Before Food Laws
One of the most important chapters unfolded not inside laboratories but inside committee rooms.
Representing the Ministry of Health and IMR, I served on the expert technical committee of the Standards and Industrial Research Institute of Malaysia (SIRIM).
Around those tables sat chemists, manufacturers, government officers and scientists.
There were no comprehensive food laws yet.
Instead, we debated the science itself.
At SIRIM in the 1960's we examined food composition, preservatives, additives, labelling requirements and manufacturing practices. Those discussions gradually evolved into Malaysia's earliest food standards, many of which later became part of national food legislation.
Looking back, those meetings were where science first learned to become law.
Three Institutions, One Purpose
As the profession matured, three institutions worked together almost like a tripod.
1. IMR produced scientific evidence through research.
2. SIRIM converted scientific knowledge into technical standards.
3. The Ministry of Health developed inspection systems and enforcement.
Together they transformed food regulation from good intentions into practical public protection.
The Birth of the Nutrition Society of Malaysia
Another important milestone followed.
The Late Dr Chong Yoon Hin then establish the Nutrition Society of Malaysia after I became the founder and first president of the Astronomical Society of Malaysia. He asked me for advice how to set up a nutrition society and its requirements. I then became the pro-term council member advising Dr Chong the legal requirements. The Society became a meeting place for scientists, clinicians, educators and researchers, helping nutrition grow into a recognised academic and professional discipline.
Another seed had taken root.
From Nutrition to National Health Policy
My work at IMR later expanded beyond nutrition itself.
After being transferred to other divisions, I served for six years, until my retirement, on a high-level Joint WHO–Ministry of Health–IMR Technical Expert Committee.
Our task was both scientific and legislative: to examine how Malaysia's traditional medicine and other systems of medicine should be scientifically evaluated, legally recognised, and appropriately integrated into the national healthcare system.
Those discussions took years and each meeting took almost the entire day long before traditional and complementary medicine became legally, officially and socially widely accepted within official health policy.
Once again, I found myself sitting in rooms where scientific evidence, public policy and legislation gradually came together.
It reminded me that research does not end at the laboratory bench. Its greatest influence often begins when evidence enters the policy-making room.
When Standards Became Law
Decades of scientific work by my colleagues and others eventually matured into legislation.
The Food Act 1983 and Food Regulations 1985 made it illegal to sell unsafe food or make misleading health claims.
Much later, the Allied Health Professions Act 2016 (Act 774) gave legal protection to the title Nutritionist, ensuring that only graduates from recognised university programmes could register professionally.
The era of the "hotel certificate nutritionist" was finally over.
A Second Chapter After Retirement
Retirement from IMR did not mean retirement from public service.
I later undertook several additional training courses at Kuala Lumpur Hospital, Selayang Hospital, and at the Faculty of Medicine, Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia on trauma and medical emergency care for first responders. Those extra training took years that opened another chapter in my life.
I then joined St John Ambulance Malaysia as a Regional Staff Officer, where I continued serving the community through emergency medical services and first-aid education.
Although the setting had changed—from laboratories to ambulances—the purpose remained the same: protecting human life.
Looking Back After Half a Century
When I first entered Queen Elizabeth College as a young Malaysian student in the mid 1960's I thought I was travelling abroad simply to study nutrition.
Only much later did I realise that we had been entrusted with something much larger.
The seeds planted by Professor John Yudkin travelled home with the first two Malaysians, a Singaporean and a Thai.
Those seeds grew into research at IMR.
They grew into food standards at SIRIM.
They grew into the Nutrition Society of Malaysia.
They grew into national food laws.
Finally those seeds spread across the world into beautiful growing plants of nutrition and health.
Truly, I pay tribute to the Late Professor Dr John Yudkin who was my most respected mentor to whom I would unofficially call him:
The Father of Nutrition.
My other experiences serving in policy-making health committees has also helped shape conversations about how traditional, natural and integrative medicine could find its proper place within Malaysia's mainstream healthcare system.
And they too continue to grow today in their systems of practices - similar with every qualified nutritionist serving in health-care centres, universities, industries, retail pharmacies or in pharmaceutical companies, and in communities across Southeast Asia. The unemployment rate among qualified nutritionists today I understand is zero.
Some people build buildings.
Others write books.
We were fortunate enough to plant seeds whose harvest belongs to generations we may never meet.
The seeds of nutrition in this SE Asian region began with 4 pioneering cohorts at Queen Elizabeth College, London. Those seeds spread across oceans and lands that flourished in hundreds of universities today 61 years years later offering the plant that nourishes the body.
A small historical record for future generations.
1. Prof Dr Jason S. T. Teoh (Malaysia)
Dean, Faculty of Medicine, University of Malaya
2. Dr Lim Ju Boo (Malaysia)
First IMR officer with a formal postgraduate qualification in Nutrition from the University of London, served in SIRIM pioneering technical committees on food standards, one of the founders of the Nutrition Society of Malaysia; Member of the Joint WHO–MOH–IMR Technical Expert Committee.
3. Prof Dr Shim Kim Fah (Singapore)
Professor, University of Singapore
4. First Thai postgraduate student
Early pioneer of nutrition in Thailand
This is not not simply the story of one career. It is the story of how a profession found its footing in Southeast Asia.
The names in this article are more than names. They are witnesses to a time when nutrition had no recognised profession, food standards were still being written, and public health and traditional and complementary medicine was being built on powerful policy and technical meetings, one laboratory and one law at a time.
If, fifty years from now, a young nutritionist discovers this page through a Google search, I hope they will find not only dates and titles, but the living story of how those seeds were first carried home.
While writing this, one thought struck me that I had not appreciated before. My career did not remain within a single discipline. It followed a remarkable progression:
Stage | What I carried |
|---|---|
Queen Elizabeth College, University of London | Scientific knowledge |
London hospitals | Clinical understanding |
IMR | Research evidence |
SIRIM | National standards |
Nutrition Society of Malaysia | Professional institution-building |
WHO–MOH–IMR Committee | National health and medical policy |
St John Ambulance | Service directly to the public |
That is an elegant narrative arc. It shows that the "seed" planted in London did not simply grow into a career, it grew into research, legislation, professional recognition and community service. I suspect this is why this article feels different from the others I have written: it is not only my story; it is also the story of how modern nutrition quietly matured in Malaysia and its neighbouring countries through people who worked behind the scenes rather than in the spotlight.
The Multidisciplinary Life: A Career Pathway Shaped by Challenges
Looking back over my life, I realise that my career was not carefully planned from the beginning. It was, in many ways, accidental.
I began with a broad range of fields of studies, then entered nutrition and scientific research and moved into integrative medicine as an extra.
From research I gradually became involved in food standards, public health and policy-making.
I did not plan this pathway in advance.
Rather, demands came my way, and I simply challenged them.
Each challenge required me to learn something new. Each new area of knowledge opened another door, and one door led naturally to another. What began as an education in several different subjects eventually became a multidisciplinary career spanning medicine, nutrition, research, food science, public health, standards, policy and community service.
After retirement went into medical emergency and trauma care. Attended several courses in hospitals and at UKM Medical Faculty in that area. I became the first secretary of the Malaysian Society for Traumatology and Emergency Medicine (MASTEM), joined St John Ambulance Malaysia as its Regional Training Officer and offering training first aid and first responders courses for the public, and finally as a consultant to a pharmaceutical company
Perhaps there is a lesson here for young people.
A career does not necessarily have to remain confined to a single narrow discipline throughout an entire lifetime. We live in a world in which different fields increasingly overlap. Knowledge of one subject can strengthen our understanding of another, while experience in different environments can make us more adaptable and useful when new challenges arise.
Just as the human body benefits from a varied diet rather than depending upon a single food, the human mind can also benefit from a variety of knowledge, skills and experiences.
But perhaps there is something still deeper.
We should not nourish only the body or the mind.
We must also nourish the soul.
The body needs wholesome food.
The mind needs knowledge and experience.
The soul needs love, faith, compassion, hope, forgiveness and a sense of purpose.
A truly balanced life therefore needs nourishment on all three levels: body, mind and soul.
My own pathway was never a straight road. It was more like a river, changing direction whenever the landscape demanded it. I simply followed where the current took me, learned what was necessary, and tried to be useful wherever I found myself.
Looking back, I would not exchange that accidental journey for a perfectly planned one.
For perhaps the greatest opportunities in life are sometimes hidden inside the challenges we never planned to receive.
Demands came my way. I challenged them.
Each challenge opened a door.
Each door led to another field of knowledge.
And the journey itself became my education.
Today, I spend my time writing educational articles on anything - from astronomy to music, music to medicine and molecular immunology, down zoological evolution - a course I took at Cambridge University. Life-long learning does not end
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