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CURRENT DOMESTIC FUEL SURCHARGE TASMANIA: 4.51 - 6.93% March 2009

Wednesday, April 23, 2008

Hot pink Tas crop brightens Japanese landscapes

Brenton and Anne Heazelwood in their pink buckwheat crop, Whitemore Tasmania April 2008
The unusual colour of a flowering buckwheat crop in northern Tasmania is generating a lot of interest.
The hot pink field at Whitemore near Carrick is being grown for seed for Japan.
Farmer, Brenton Heazelwood says Japanese farmers will plant paddocks of it to purely brighten up the landscape.
"They just use it purely for sowing and making the countryside look pretty," he said.
"They want it for the pink flower, all the other buckwheat of course is white flowering and it's used for noodle making but this is purely an ornamental, I suppose you would term it."
Anne Heazlewood says the Cancer Council in Tasmania has taken photos of the field and may use the image for its next campaign.
"Oh it'll be lovely, yes," she siad.
"Normally they have figures planted in a lawn of pink or something like that but i think this will be a nice different approach to their advertising campaign."

Tuesday, April 22, 2008

CKYH ships put on the brakes

Janet Porter - Monday 21 April 2008

Cosco: part of the CKYH alliance.FOUR powerful Asian container lines have agreed to slow down their ships and eliminate duplicate port calls as part of a wide-ranging programme aimed at slashing record high fuel bills Cosco Container Lines, K Line, Yang Ming and Hanjin Shipping, which co-operate through the CKYH alliance, will be adding a ninth vessel wherever possible to their Asia-Europe services.That will enable ships to lower steaming speeds from 25 knots to about 21.5 knots. The consortium operates eight loops between Asia and northern Europe, of which two covering the longest route from northern China are already run with nine vessels. The network also includes another three strings between Asia and the western Mediterranean, and three to the eastern Mediterranean. Several other lines or alliances have slowed their ships in the Asia-Europe trades as bunker prices hit unprecedented highs, but this is not appropriate on shorter routes as it would be impossible then to maintain weekly schedules. A 10% speed reduction can cut fuel consumption by 30%, and so generate massive savings. The four lines are now looking for additional tonnage to slot into their Asia-Europe rotations. That could include ships redeployed from the Pacific if the quartet decides to reduce capacity there. But if the right units cannot be found, the CKYH alliance is prepared to run some of its Asia-Europe loops at slower speeds with eight ships, and miss one weekly call, said Takafumi Kido, deputy general manager of K Line’s container business group planning team. The determination to save fuel follows a summit meeting of senior staff from the four lines in Japan earlier this month. They agreed to proceed with various strategies. including the rationalisation of services in the transpacific and Asia-Europe trades, and further co-operation on terminal operations and equipment sharing. As well as slow steaming, the lines are also preparing to revise schedules so that there is no unnecessary duplication of port calls between the various services. That may be the best way of saving fuel on the Pacific where there is less scope to decrease speeds. Instead, the lines hope to reduce the number of separate calls at Asian load ports. Even though the Pacific trades are in poor shape right now, the consortium has not yet decided whether to remove capacity by deploying smaller ships, or possibly offering fewer than the current 14 loops it now operates between Asia and the US west coast. If ships are withdrawn, they could be transferred to routes such as the Middle East trades where conditions are much better, said Mr Kido in a telephone interview.

Friday, April 18, 2008

Carbon footprint, not food miles

Report: Merian Ellis
Tasmanian food producers may score relatively well in the new age of carbon awareness, if New Zealand's experience is anything to go by.The climate change debate is pushing all industries to evaluate their carbon footprint, for example, more than 30 businesses on King Island are undertaking a carbon audit as part of a 12 month King Island Sustainable Futures program.Apricot grower and chairman of the Tasmanian Food Industry Council Heather Chong says assessing carbon footprint is likely to be a better path to purse for the state, compared to counting food miles (the distance food travels to market).Heather Chong says food miles have the potential to disadvantage Tasmanian exporters, compared to the state's carbon footprint."New Zealand did an interesting study recently where they could actually prove that goods purchased from New Zealand were actually better, if you looked at the carbon footprint basis, than goods purchased from Europe going into the UK market because New Zealand, like us, uses a lot of renewable energy.So I think if we go down the carbon footprint route, as opposed to the food miles, we stand a much better chance of being able to still continue to sell goods into overseas markets."
In this report: Chairman of the Tasmanian Food Council Heather Chong.

Farms cash in despite big dry

Article from:

NICK CLARK
April 18, 2008 12:00am
TASMANIAN farmers are set to cash in on rising grain and oilseed prices as competition for land grows between agricultural commodities -- despite the drought.A survey by rural lender Rabobank suggests a good outlook for grain prices in the medium term. Tasmanian Farmers and Graziers Association cereals and seed committee chairman Crosby Lyne said cereal crops were increasing. "The drought has meant a lot of people have got rid of their livestock and may plant more cereal crops if the season breaks," he said. "Fertiliser prices have gone up 50 per cent to $1500 a tonne which resulted in farmers planting crops which need less fertiliser." Mr Lyne said there was pressure for acreage. "The poppy growing companies are desperate for more ground in the 2008-09 season," he said. "There are plenty of small seed and grass seed contracts available as well. In these dry years barley has proved to be a pretty versatile crop for malting and as a feed for livestock." "Cascade and ABB, which malt for Boag's, are pretty keen to get more barley." Mr Lyne said the greater upside in potential yield of wheat than barley had prompted some to favour wheat. "Some farmers are growing wheat under irrigation," he said. North-West contractor Greg McDonald said he expected to harvest 4000 tonnes of wheat in 2009 up from 2000 tonnes in 2008. "I've had more inquiries from people wanting to grow wheat than ever before," he said. "There are people growing wheat that had never grown it." He said farmers were "getting screwed by spud factories" and were looking at lower production costs of wheat and grains. "The way fertiliser prices have increased, unless there's a big increase in the price of potatoes they're better off to grow wheat," he said. He said wheat needed less water than vegetables and were "less work". Mr Lyne said there had been an increase in canola crops for stock feed and poppy seed for biodiesel. ABS data shows Tasmania grew just 8000 hectares of both barley and wheat and 1000ha of canola in 2005-06.

Tuesday, April 15, 2008

Plant closure forces speciality fibres overseas

Report: Anna Vidot and Rose Grant
Tasmanian specialty fibre producers will be forced to send their goods overseas for processing, or shut up shop, when Australia's only small scouring plant closes at the end of June.The CSIRO facility in Victoria processes fibre for smaller scale and niche producers, with an estimated 1000 businesses relying on the service.The CSIRO says it is still holding discussions about the future of the plant, but producers claim they have been told to start looking elsewhere for the processing services.One of those who relies on the CSIRO facility is Elaine McDonald. She has been selling woollen garments at Hobart's Salamanca Market for over two decades, but she says the future of the business is now in doubt."You can not have the wool spun at a mill if it's not scoured, and there is nowhere else in Australia that will take small lots of wool or coloured wool, natural coloured wool."The Australian alpaca industry has also be forced to send fleeces overseas.Matt McAninley from Australian Alpaca Fleece Limited says the CSIRO scourer has become integral to the development of the rare natural fibre industries in Australia and its closure will impact upon thousands of individuals and small businesses, as well as a small number of large Australian companies."We've now had to look at alternatives, which involves sending fleece to New Zealand. "It's not ideal because it's certainly quite a significant increase in costs. But we're also now sending fleece to Peru which is greasy fleece and we've managed to have the requirements changed. We weren't able to send greasy fleece into Peru but we are now able to," he said.
In this report: Elaine McDonald, In Sheep's Clothing; Matt McAninley, Australian Alpaca Fleece Limited

1984 - Bin Brother is watching you


By Karen Barlow
Posted Mon Apr 14, 2008 2:26pm AEST

RFID chips allow the council to work out who is recycling and who isn't. (File photo) (ABC News: Giulio Saggin)
There is revolution going on in waste management, which Big Brother would be proud of.
Tucked away under the rim of wheelie bins found in two Sydney councils are small radio frequency tracking devices collecting information on a household's waste habits.
Randwick Mayor Bruce Notley-Smith told The World Today they are the way of the future.
"We will be able to find out the weights of the various bins and collect the data, the entire amount, as opposed to the quantity that is recyclable," he said.
The garbage truck reads the data on the bin, weighs the bin, and the data is collated on a computer.
"We've aimed to increase or target problem areas in the city where there's a lower level of recycling," Mr Notley-Smith said.
"The fact is that 50 per cent of the city of Randwick is multi-unit dwellings and we have faced a number of challenges there with getting compliance with recycling."
The data collected will allow the council to confirm which areas are recycling and which are not.
Ryde is the other council using the tracking devices. It has done so since 2006 and says it has helped to raise local recycling rates to about 48 per cent.
But champions of recycling, such as Clean Up Australia founder Ian Kiernan, are underwhelmed.
"I don't believe they deserve huge praise for an environmental initiative because I don't think it is that," he said.
"I think it's simply a somewhat effective commercial move. It's like when you have metered electricity, you can look at your meter and see how you can count it back.
"But this information is not going back to the consumer, to the rubbish producer, the householder - it is simply for that particular waste company to keep a track of its bins."
The data collected by the tracking devices is supposed to stay between the council and the contractor, WSN Environmental Solutions, due to privacy concerns.
Mr Kiernan says the information should be shared with the garbage thrower.
"They could say, 'We've got to cut down on what we're paying to get rid of your rubbish. We obviously need to remove some of the recycling that's going into the waste stream, or we've got to look at our purchasing so we're buying less packaging.' And [there are] so many things that you can do in that little household audit, once you have the data," he said.
But Mr Notley-Smith says he is not in it to make money for the council.
"It's our obligation to collect as much as for our recyclable material as we possibly can and reduce as much as we can the amount of waste going into landfill," he said.
"The commercial imperative is not the issue here. We're trying to minimise the amount of waste which is going into landfill.
"The contractor, what they actually do with the recyclable material, that's for the market to decide."
Recycling can be big business. It is no surprise that one of Australia's richest men is the 'Cardboard King', Richard Pratt.
Mr Kiernan says more needs to be done on the individual, government and business level to reduce waste.
"Some proportion of what is recyclable is actually going to landfill because it's convenient and it can be cheaper than recycling," he said.
"Now, I haven't tracked down the validity of those claims, but we've just got to realise that we have got to improve our waste management.
"And the good operators are doing it, they're looking to how they do it everyday. But just putting tags on bins is not a huge stride forward in the name of the environment."

Launceston's once-troubled James Nelson weaving mill is expanding, employing more workers to help meet new orders

40 workers lost their jobs when the textile factory's former owners closed it down to retire before Christmas.
The State Government stepped in with $250,000 to help James Nelson's management and workers secure a buy-out.
The factory re-opened six weeks ago with 24 workers.
It has now secured new interstate orders and is offering jobs to four more past employees.
They should start work within the next two weeks.
James Nelson's managers say they are thrilled by the interest from potential customers and are negotiating for overseas contracts.

Friday, April 11, 2008

TCCI says productivity gains essential for further growth

Posted 4 hours 7 minutes ago
Tasmania's main employer body believes the state's economy is running nearly at full capacity.
The Tasmanian Chamber of Commerce and Industry has welcomed the March trend unemployment rate of 5%, which is unchanged from the previous month.
However, it says the participation rate continues to be a worry.
The Chamber's senior economist, Richard Dowling, says productivity improvements are now crucial if the economy is to advance.
"The economy is basically running at its speed limit now, and we don't see as a business chamber much room for further growth in the labour force, unless we can actually find ways to increase the speed limit of the economy, and that is essentially productivity improvements," he said.

Wednesday, April 09, 2008

Organic babies booming

Report: Cameron Wilson
One Tasmanian company that has focussed on producing organic food for babies is also reporting a boost in sales.Bellamy's Organics has seen a 28 per cent rise in business over the last six months. The company is based in Launceston and owns the largest organic apple orchard in the southern hemisphere at Paramatta Creek.Bellamy's Organics co-founder Dooley Crighton says it's parents concern for their babies that's driving the growth. "I think there there is so much more awareness with environmental concerns and what's put on our food, the taste factor of the food, that there is a lot more awareness and education through the media."
In this report: Dooley Crighton, co-founder Ballamy's Organics

Tasmania tipping record wine vintage

Report: Cameron Wilson
Tasmanian wine grape growers are headed for a record harvest.Halfway through the vintage conservative estimates put this years yield at more than 8000 tonnes.That will surpasses the previous record set in 2004 and is a huge 60 per cent up on last year's frost affected yield. Executive Officer of Wine Industry Tasmania Stuart Nettlefold says there's all indication are that quality is also good this vintage."It also does give us opportunity to expand into certainly the national market, distributing into other states."There are a number of brands already doing that but I suppose it does pave the way for brands to expand, those that aren't, into the likes of Melbourne, Sydney or the eastern seaboard."
In this report: Stuart Nettlefold, executive officer of Wine Industry Tasmania

Kids drive the growth of organics

Report: Andrew Collins
The organic foods industry is benefiting big time from an unlikely demographic - children under the age of eight.Major Industry members say parents, who themselves often remain on a diet of non-organic produce, are increasingly keen to raise their young on organic foods.Rick Carmont, organic category manager with dairy exporter, Fonterra, said kids are making up a huge chunk of their organic dairy sales."Looking at all the research and there's a lot of it, we're estimating somewhere pretty close to a third of the organic products, dairy products, will be consumed by children under eight years old."Biological Farmers of Australia nutritionist, Shane Heaton, said parents are increasingly realising the health benefits organic produce can give to their children."One of the key life events that brings people into buying organic food is having children, so they often start buying organics with things like baby food and fruit and veg to make food for their kids," he said."Children have a greater susceptibility to toxins than adults. They have a higher intake of food and drink per kilo of body weight. They have still developing immune systems and still developing brains. All these things combine to mean they are susceptible to a toxic burden and parents intuitively understand this."On a retail level, Mal Green, who runs an organic food store in Darwin, said while parents may introduce kids to organic produce, it appears that the kids are the keenest to stay on that type of diet."The kids, they just roll through the door, they usually beat mum and dad through the door most of the time and they think its fun coming there, you can see it, its so obvious, it shocked us a bit over the years," he said.And after years of witnessing the behaviour of children around organic produce, Mr Green believes kids are hooked by the taste."We've heard it so many times that mum would start shopping buying organic food and she'll tell dad that the kids can tell the difference...and dad has said rubbish and he's gone and done his shopping at one of the supermarkets, come back and cooked the food, the kids stuck his fork in the piece of carrot, put it in his mouth and spat it out...it shocks us how often we hear that story."

Tuesday, April 08, 2008

Innovation

It is often said that the best ideas are the simplest ones. The humble container is the perfect example of that. On the surface, it just looks like a simple steel box. But dig a little deeper and you can discover a world of innovation that has accompanied it on its journey since it was developed just 50 years ago.
Continuous thinking by the industry about how to make the basic idea better has led to a highly efficient, joined-up form of cargo transport that was unthinkable just 50 years ago. The combination of increasingly efficient ships, the standardisation of containers and ever-faster connections between other forms of transport is a triumph of logistics. It means that as consumers, we can enjoy a huge range of products from around the world and at prices that would scarcely have been conceivable in earlier times.
Container ships have continued to become bigger and more efficient to a remarkable degree, all with the simple aim of making cargo transport more efficient, reliable, cost-effective and environmentally-friendly. The world’s biggest ships in 2007 are an astonishing 1,300 feet long – nearly 400m or the distance around an Olympic running track. They are such sights that large crowds gather at ports across the world to watch them dock.
They can carry 11,000 20-foot containers (also known as twenty-foot equivalent units or TEU). If you loaded all of those containers onto a train it would be 71 kilometres or 44 miles long . Their engine rooms are six storeys high and one of their rudders is the size of a London double-decker bus. Yet they can be operated by teams of as few as 13 people. And even larger container ships are under construction.
These ships combine large capacity with immense power and speed. A container vessel capable of carrying between 8,000 and 10,000 TEUs can be loaded with 77,000 tons of cargo – the equivalent of 300 jumbo jets – and travel at up to 24.8 knots, or about 46 kilometres per hour. To shift this amount of cargo, a large container ship engine has approximately 110,000 brake horsepower, about 1,000 times more than a family car. This power is employed incredibly efficiently and as a result container shipping remains the most efficient way to move cargo.
The standard container itself features innovations that ensure the goods inside are kept secure. For example, general purpose containers are watertight to protect the cargo from rain and sea-spray while ‘reefer’ containers are refrigerated so that perishable or sensitive goods such as cheese, fruit and vegetables, fish, meat, wine or pharmaceuticals remain in top condition during transit.
While of a standard size to enable quick and easy transport, containers are also available in a variety of configurations that include ‘end-opening’, ‘side-opening’, ‘half-height’, ‘open-top’, ‘flat track’, ‘liquid bulk’, and ‘modular’ . This makes container shipping incredibly versatile and able to transport just about any product imaginable.
Containers and container ships are part of a highly-sophisticated logistical system. Starting at the dockside, containers are not just stacked randomly onto ships: computer software enables precise planning for the loading and unloading of containers. This makes the process run very efficiently as well as helping keep the vessel stable.
If you thought that container shipping was just about hardware, think again. The industry exploits advances in e-commerce to allow it to offer customers an evermore convenient and efficient service. Increasingly, tariff checks, booking, payment, and invoicing are occurring online, whenever and wherever the customer desires, and with real-time results. Throughout the cargo’s journey, online ‘track-and–trace’ systems allow shippers to follow their containers along the supply chain, from where they were picked up, to where they are delivered at the end . This means that customers can manage their businesses safe in the knowledge that they know what goods are going to arrive where and when. So it is no surprise that the container shipping industry prides itself on getting the right product to the right place at the right time with accuracy.
With innovation and evolution continuing throughout the industry, container shipping leads international trade and brings evermore benefits to both businesses and customers across the world.
Not bad for a simple steel box!

GM crop advisers accused of bias

Date: April 2 2008Daniel Lewis
TWO members of the expert committee that advises the State Government on genetically modified crops claim they are gagged from speaking about the committee's work, and the committee's make-up is kept from the public to hide the fact it is stacked with pro-GM appointees.
The committee's chairman, Tim Reeves, also sits on the board of the Grains Research and Development Corporation, which invests in GM research.
Professor Reeves says he judges GM issues on their merits and has no conflict of interest. He believes other committee members operate similarly.
Not even the names of the committee's members appear on the Department of Primary Industries website, but it includes people from the CSIRO, the Australian Wheat Board (AWB), the NSW Farmers' Association, GrainCorp and the plant-breeding organisation CropLife - all organisations that have supported GM crops.
Professor Reeves said GM legislation demanded a publicly available register listing committee members and their pecuniary interests be kept.
But the Herald was told it could only be viewed where it is kept at a Department of Primary Industries office in Tamworth.
Last month, the Primary Industries Minister, Ian Macdonald, announced historic approval for GM canola to be grown commercially after an application from seed companies.
"As part of the legislated requirements, I referred the application to the expert committee to assess and the committee's subsequent advice was that the application met the criteria required," he said. But not all committee members agreed.
The environmental scientist Jo Immig and canola grower Juliet McFarlane say the go-ahead should not have been given because segregation of GM and non-GM canola cannot be guaranteed and non-GM farmers have no legal protection if their crops are contaminated by GM.
Mrs McFarlane was previously appointed by the Government to a GM "advisory committee" as a representative of the anti-GM Network of Concerned Farmers.
When the Government amended its GM moratorium act late last year to allow the approval of GM crops, the members of the advisory committee became independent members of the "expert committee".
Mrs McFarlane said that as the committee's only canola grower, it was ridiculous that she could not talk to other canola growers about the committee's work.
Professor Reeves said confidentiality was necessary. But Mrs McFarlane said: "There is no commercially sensitive material in our discussions.
"The NSW community has a right to know that the expert committee was split on the recommendation for approval of genetically engineered canola.
"The expert committee has been gagged … and we are unable to publicly debate the contentious application for fear of a jail sentence."
Professor Reeves denied that he maked sure the minister only heard certain views.
The committee's members "are not appointed to be pro or against the technology", he said. "I believe in their integrity."
On two occasions the Greens MP Ian Cohen unsuccessfully asked Mr Macdonald to provide the names on the committee and declarations of pecuniary interest.

Will Wheat-Killer Fungus be used to spread GMO wheat?

F. William Engdahl Global Research March 30
A deadly fungus, known as Ug99, which kills wheat, has likely spread to Pakistan from Africa according to reports in the British New Scientist magazine. If true, that threatens the vital Asian Bread Basket including the Punjab region. The spread of the deadly virus, stem rust, against which an effective fungicide does not exist, comes as world grain stocks reach the lowest in four decades and government subsidized bio-ethanol production, especially in the USA, Brazil and EU are taking land out of food production at alarming rates. The deadly fungus is being used by Monsanto and the US Government to spread patented GMO seeds.
Stem rust is the worst of three rusts that afflict wheat plants. The fungus grows primarily in the stems, plugging the vascular system so carbohydrates can’t get from the leaves to the grain, which shrivels. In the 1950s, the last major outbreak destroyed 40% of the spring wheat crop in North America. At that time governments started a major effort to breed resistant wheat plants, led by Norman Borlaug of the Rockefeller Foundation. That was the misnamed Green Revolution. The result today is far fewer varieties of wheat that might resist such a new fungus outbreak.
The first strains of Ug99 were detected in 1999 in Uganda. It spread to Kenya by 2001, to Ethiopia by 2003 and to Yemen when the cyclone Gonu spread its spores in 2007. Now the deadly fungus has been found in Iran and according to British scientists may already be as far as Pakistan.
Pakistan and India account for 20 percent of the annual world wheat production. It is possible as the fungus spreads that large movements could take place almost overnight if certain wind conditions prevail at the right time. In 2007 a three-day wind event recorded by Mexico’s CIMMYT (International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center), had strong wind currents moving from Yemen, where Ug99 is present, across Pakistan and India, going all the way to China. CIMMYT estimates that from two-thirds to three-quarters of the wheat now planted in India and Pakistan are highly susceptible to this new strain of stem rust. One billion people who live in this region and they are highly dependent on wheat for their food supply.
These are all areas where the agricultural infrastructure to contain such problems is either extremely weak or non-existent. It threatens to spread into other wheat producing regions of Asia and eventually the entire world if not checked.
FAO World Grain Forecast
The 2007 World Agriculture Forecast of the United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) in Rome, projects an alarming trend in world food supply in the absence of any devastation from Ug99. The report states, “countries in the non-OECD region are expected to continue to experience a much stronger increase in consumption of agricultural products than countries in the OECD area. This trend is driven by population and, above all, income growth – underpinned by rural migration to higher income urban areas...OECD countries as a group are projected to lose production and export shares in many commodities…Growth in the use of agricultural commodities as feedstock to a rapidly increasing biofuel industry is one of the main drivers in the outlook and one of the reasons for international commodity prices to attain a significantly higher plateau over the outlook period than has been reported in the previous reports.” (my emphasis—w.e.).
The FAO warns that the explosive growth in acreage used to grow fuels and not food in the past three years is dramatically changing the outlook for food supply globally and forcing food prices sharply higher for all foods from cereals to sugar to meat and dairy products. The use of cereals, sugar, oilseeds and vegetable oils to satisfy the needs of a rapidly
increasing bio-fuel industry, is one of the main drivers, most especially the large volumes of maize in the US, wheat and rapeseed in the EU and sugar in Brazil for ethanol and bio-diesel production. This is already causing dramatically higher crop prices, higher feed costs and sharply higher prices for livestock products.
Ironically, the current bio-ethanol industry is being driven by US government subsidies and a scientifically false argument in the EU and USA that bio-ethanol is less harmful to the environment than petroleum fuels and can reduce CO2 emissions. The arguments have been demonstrated in every respect to be false. The huge expansion of global acreage now planted to produce bio-fuels is creating ecological problems and demanding use of far heavier pesticide spraying while use of bio-fuels in autos releases even deadlier emissions than imagined. The political effect, however, has been a catastrophic shift in world grain stocks at the same time the EU and USA have enacted policies which drastically cut traditional emergency grain reserves. In short, it is a scenario pre-programmed for catastrophe, one which has been clear to policymakers in the EU and USA for several years. That can only suggest that such a dramatic crisis in global food supply is intentional.
Ug99 is a race of stem rust that blocks the vascular tissues in cereal grains including wheat, oats and barley. Unlike other rusts that may reduce crop yields, Ug99-infected plants may suffer up to 100 percent loss.
A plan to spread GMO?
One of the consequences of the spread of Ug99 is a campaign by Monsanto Corporation and other major producers of genetically manipulated plant seeds to promote wholesale introduction of GMO wheat varieties said to be resistant to the Ug99 fungus. Biologists at Monsanto and at the various GMO laboratories around the world are working to patent such strains.
Norman Borlaug, the former Rockefeller Foundation head of the Green Revolution is active in funding the research to develop a fungus resistant variety against Ug99 working with his former center in Mexico, the CIMMYT and ICARDA in Kenya, where the pathogen is now endemic. So far, about 90% of the 12,000 lines tested are susceptible to Ug99. That includes all the major wheat cultivars of the Middle East and west Asia. At least 80% of the 200 varieties sent from the United States can’t cope with infection. The situation is even more dire for Egypt, Iran, and other countries in immediate peril.
Even if a new resistant variety was ready to be released today it would take two or three years’ seed increase in order to have just enough wheat seed for 20 percent of the acres planted to wheat in the world.
Work is also being done by the USDA’s Agricultural Research Service (ARS), the same agency which co-developed Monsanto’s Terminator seed technology. In my book, Seeds of Destruction I document the insidious role of Borlaug and the Rockefeller Foundation in promoting patents on food seeds to reduce global population. The spreading alarm over the Ug99 fungus is being used by Monsanto and other GMO agribusiness companies to demand that the current ban on GMO wheat be lifted to allow spread of GMO patented wheat seeds on the argument they are Ug99 stem rust resistant.
F. William Engdahl is a Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization and the author of Seeds of Destruction: the Hidden Agenda of Genetic Manipulation published by Global Research and A Century of War: Anglo-American Oil Politics and the New World Order (Pluto Press). He may be contacted at http://www.engdahl.oilgeopolitics.net.
F. William Engdahl is a leading analyst of the New World Order, author of the best-selling book on oil and geopolitics, A Century of War: Anglo-American Politics and the New World Order,’ His writings have been translated into more than a dozen languages.
Reviews of Engdahl’s Seeds of Destruction
What is so frightening about Engdahl’s vision of the world is that it is so real. Although our civilization has been built on humanistic ideals, in this new age of “free markets”, everything-- science, commerce, agriculture and even seeds-- have become weapons in the hands of a few global corporation barons and their political fellow travelers. To achieve world domination, they no longer rely on bayonet-wielding soldiers. All they need is to control food production. (Dr. Arpad Pusztai, biochemist, formerly of the Rowett Research Institute Institute, Scotland)
If you want to learn about the socio-political agenda --why biotech corporations insist on spreading GMO seeds around the World-- you should read this carefully researched book. You will learn how these corporations want to achieve control over all mankind, and why we must resist… (Marijan Jost, Professor of Genetics, Krizevci, Croatia)
The book reads like a murder mystery of an incredible dimension, in which four giant Anglo-American agribusiness conglomerates have no hesitation to use GMO to gain control over our very means of subsistence… (Anton Moser, Professor of Biotechnology, Graz, Austria).
Disclaimer: The views expressed in this article are the sole responsibility of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of the Centre for Research on Globalization.

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Australian Trade Deficit Grows for 75th Consecutive Month


By Dan Denning • April 8th, 2008
What a strange economy Australia has. A country in the midst of a record boom still manages to run a trade deficit. Yesterday, the Australian Bureau of Statistics reported that the February trade deficit blew out by 30%, from a revised $2.59 billion in January to $3.29 billion in February.
Exports fell by 4%, or about $18.2 billion in the month. The big laggards were metal ores, minerals, and coal. Metal ores and mineral exports fell by 18% in the month, or $624 million. Coal exports fell by 16%, or $281 million. Coal and metal ores weren't exactly being lazy. You can blame the weather (flooding) and continued bottlenecks in export infrastructure.
There is a simple explanation for Australia's trade deficit: the country really doesn't make much. How else can you explain something that's been a regular feature of the economic landscape for the past 75 months? From our quick scan of the figures at the ABS, the last time the country ran a monthly trade surplus was in October of 2001.
Since then, of course, exports have ramped up with the resource boom. But as the Aussie dollar has strengthened and the U.S. dollar weakened, export profits have been tempered by the fact that Aussie exports face rising costs in local currency terms but get paid in weaker U.S. dollar prices.
The upside is that commodity prices have been rising. Some of this is dollar weakness. Some of it is too little supply. And much of it is growing demand. This all makes for rising prices.
And while we're on the subject of rising prices, let's hear it for iron ore, thermal coal, and coking coal!
The standoff with China over the iron ore contract is partially responsible for the $800 million fall off in trade revenue. But that revenue is about to soar again with a series of agreements on the price for steel making ingredients. How can the steel producers still make a profit with iron ore and coking coal prices rising so much? Hold that thought.
The Financial Review reported yesterday that BHP is close to sealing the deal with South Korean steel maker Posco for a coking coal price of US$300 in 2008-2009. That is up from US$97 last year. That's a nice little gain. Coking coal in the spot market is already going for around US$350, according to the Fin. Australia exports 68% of the world's seaborne coking coal.
Iron ore, you say? We covered it earlier this week. But we reckon the contract price will rise by at least 75% before June 30th. And even thermal coal for power plants is expected to at least double from its current contract price of US$56 per tonne.
Combined, the rise in coal prices should boost export income from by $35 billion to $56 billion. That will be handy to have. Still, don't expect a huge improvement in the trade deficit. If you look closely at the breakdown in the import figures, there's a lot Australians import from abroad.
The main three categories (according to the ABS) are consumption goods, capital goods, and intermediate goods. This includes things like textiles, electronics, toys, books, leisure items (in the consumption goods category) and things like civil aircraft parts, telecommunications equipment and industrial machinery (capital goods), as well as well as fuels, lubricants, papers, plastics and spare parts (intermediate goods).
If you don't make it here you have to buy it from somewhere, or have it not at all. Australia does produce some things. But for a rich Western economy, its production-and lets remember this a country of 20 million people-is largely concentrated in raw materials and agricultural goods, not finished manufactured products.
The strong dollar eases the pain of imports a bit, especially since many of the imports are cheap and come from Asia. But it's generally true that profit margins are greater in finished goods than raw materials. Australia's had its bacon saved in this respect because resource prices have been rising by so much and so quickly.
Makes you wonder what will happen in a generation or two (perhaps less), when the resource profit growth is gone and the country's productive capacity hasn't been diversified. Expect to see a lot of service jobs at low wages.
We were a bit gloomy yesterday about Australia's prospects for decreasing it reliance in imported refined fuels. A larger question might be whether the country can increase its net oil production. Consumption is growing faster than production. Like every major country in the world, Australia would like to find more domestic oil.
The good thing about finding oil is that geologists can tell you what kind of geologic formations bear oil. The bad thing about finding oil is that its getting more expensive, mostly because companies are having to look further and further off shore, just to find reserves to replace current production (not to ad to reserves.) The government is getting busy.
"The Australian government invited bids for 35 oil and gas exploration permits in five petroleum basins off the northwest and southwest coasts as it seeks to address a rising deficit in crude-oil supply," reports Angela Macdonald-Smith in Bloomberg. "Australian spending on exploration jumped 57 percent last year to a record $2.66 billion even as the number of wells drilled fell, as equipment and labor shortages drove up costs. Explorers need to boost work in frontier areas to avoid a A$28 billion petroleum trade deficit within a decade."
The permits on offer are for exploration in the Browse, Bonaparte, and Canarvon and Perth Basins. As you can see from the picture below, courtesy of the Department of Energy, Resources, and Tourism, all this years offshore exploration permits are in the West. Proceeding clockwise, the basins are Perth, Carnarvon, Roebuck, Browse, and Bonaparte.
Source: Department of Resources, Energy, and Tourism
There are a ton of off-shore petroleum development projects in WA from last year. We're also keeping our eye on off-shore natural gas in the Otway and Cooper Basins in South Australia.
Dan DenningThe Daily Reckoning Australia

World-Class INCAT Vessel Destined for Japan

Minister for Economic Development and Tourism, Paula Wriedt, today attended the INCAT Naming Ceremony for its new high-speed luxury catamaran destined for Japan.
Ms Wriedt presented Mr Tashiro, President of Libera Holdings, the leading ship operator in Japan, with a gift to mark the occasion of the naming of the Natchan World.
“INCAT Tasmania has developed a solid working relationship with Libera Holdings resulting in the building of two world-class luxury catamarans,” Ms Wriedt said.
“This relationship is a great example of how Tasmanian businesses can create products of outstanding quality and gain recognition on the world-stage.
“The first vessel was delivered to Libera Holdings in August last year and the second vessel marks INCAT’s most valuable export to date.
“Natchan World is one of the largest vessels built by INCAT and stands at 112.6 metres long and weighs in at nearly 11 000 gross tonnes.
“This new vessel has been built for speed and luxury, can be enjoyed by up to 800 people and has the capacity to hold 355 cars.
“Natchan World has a new form of relaxation for Executive Class passengers which cannot be experienced on any flights, trains or cruise ships.
“Instead of individual seats, there are small booth-style compartments for passengers to lie down and relax, as well as massage chairs,” Ms Wriedt said.

Now Tassie Says G’day Vancouver!

After a hugely successful two weeks in the United States earlier this year, Tasmania has again made its mark internationally, this time in Canada as part of G’day Vancouver Australia Week 2008.
The Minister for Economic Development and Tourism, Paula Wriedt, said Tasmania even had the jump on other Australian destinations this year thanks to a two-week pre-event promotion on CityTV Vancouver.
From 19 March, CityTV’s popular breakfast program, Breakfast Television, promoted the Hunt Down Under Sweepstakes – a week-long competition for one CityTV viewer to win a holiday for two to Tasmania.
“Tasmania was the Australian destination on Canadian lips even before G’day Vancouver officially started on 4 April,” Ms Wriedt said.
“In addition to the Tasmanian holiday promotional clips and live on-air announcements, CityTV also broadcast a Discover Tasmania commercial produced specifically for the North American market,” Ms Wriedt said.
In another major coup, Tasmania was offered the position of presenter at Australia Week’s only gala event, the Penfolds Macquarie Wild Tasmania gala dinner.
“Approximately 250 high-profile guests attended including Canadian business leaders such as CanWest Media and Macquarie North America, tourism partners, Aussie Specialist travel agents and senior government officials such as the Australian High Commissioner,” Ms Wriedt said.
“They were treated to Tasmanian gift bags, a 15-minute Tasmania presentation, and promotional Tasmania footage surrounded them on giant screens.
“They were also treated to a taste of some of Tasmania’s world-class cuisine including smoked trout and gourmet cheese.
“Former Australian of the Year and eminent environmentalist, Tim Flannery, presented the keynote address, and Tasmania’s own Hollywood movie star, Rachael Taylor, was officially recognised as a Tasmanian ambassador,” Ms Wriedt said.
Australia Week saw the launch of a three-month long exhibition of Australia’s unique wildlife and natural environment at Vancouver’s iconic Science World: Planet Oz – Walk on Australia’s Wild Side.
Ms Wriedt said the Tasmanian exhibit is the cornerstone for the entire exhibition and highlights the unique challenge we face to protect the iconic Tasmanian devil.
It is anticipated 125,000 people will visit the exhibition over the three months.
“Tasmania was involved in numerous media events and promotional activities throughout the four-day program, organised each year by Tourism Australia,” Ms Wriedt said.
“And Tasmania’s Canadian exposure won’t end with the completion of G’day Vancouver.
“Tourism Tasmania has developed an advertisement for Australian feature in the April edition of the Canadian Traveller, the country’s only destination focused travel trade publication,” Ms Wriedt said.

New Pollution Regulations Will Affect Shipping Industry

Tough new limits on pollutants are likely to cost the oil and ship industry billions of dollars, according to a Reuters report.
The United Nation's International Maritime Organisation (IMO) agreed to targets last week that would drastically cut sulphur emissions from ship fuel by 2015.
According to the report, the revision of existing marine pollution laws will take place in two phases. The first will require cleaner burning distillate fuels in Sulphur Emission Control Areas (SECA) by 2015--followed by a reduction of sulphur content in all fuels from 2020-2025.
For more in-depth coverage on the new regulations, and their effects on the fuel and ship industries, read: "UN Body Nears Agreeing Ship Pollutant Limits."

Doctors issue climate change health warning

Doctors are warning that the health system needs to prepare for increased rates of climate change-related illness in the population.
The Climate Change Institute has released a report by Doctors for the Environment, which warns that floods, droughts, rising seas and higher temperatures caused by climate change will bring a raft of health problems.
Co-author Doctor Graeme Horton says that includes more cases of heat stroke, mosquito-transmitted diseases and gastroenteritis outbreaks.
He says its important for the health system and the community to be prepared to cope with the strain.
"Climate change is clearly much, much more than an economic inconvenience - it is a threat to our life support systems," he said.
He says the elderly, children and those living in coastal and rural areas will be among those worst affected.
"For Australian communities we're expecting in coming years more heat waves, more effects of heat stress and more days of high to extreme fire danger," he said.
"We're expecting more storms and extreme weather events and the health impacts of these will include flooding and trauma and infectious disease outbreaks."
The report has been released on the eve of World Health Day, which has the theme "protecting health from climate change".

$2.3m ACL rescue Manufacturer was '48 hours' from closure

08 April 2008 - 3:46PM
By TOM ELLISON

A LAST-MINUTE rescue package has saved 285 jobs at Launceston's ACL Bearing Co. and averted a factory closure that threatened to cripple Australia's car industry.
Chairman of parent company Automotive Components, Ivan James, said the Launceston operation was just 48 hours from collapse until yesterday's $2.3 million joint State and Federal government bailout.
Closure of the business would have caused massive disruption to the automotive manufacturing sector, with Holden, Ford and Toyota sourcing all their precision engine bearings from the business.
But the Government assistance, together with financial incentives provided by the car manufacturers will keep the doors of the Launceston operation open while the company explores restructuring options.
ACL Bearing Co. is Australia's sole remaining manufacturer of precision engine bearings, although the company's future has been under threat in recent years in the face of cheaper imports and a strong Australian dollar.

The Federal and Tasmanian Governments have announced a $2.3million rescue package for a Launceston car parts manufacturer.

The ACL Bearing Group cut its workforce from 400 to 300 last year and its sister company cut 300 jobs in February after Mitsubishi Motors' Adelaide factory closed.
The Federal Government has given $2million and the State Government $330,000 to help ACL find extra business so that it can keep producing parts.
The Federal Minister for Innovation and Industry, Senator Kim Carr, says if ACL closed, it would bring Australia's automotive manufacturing to a standstill.
"This is a company that's unique in Australia," Senator Carr said.
"It's the only company in Australia that makes bearings to keep our engines running and if we had not taken action we would have faced a shutdown of the entire industry with tens of thousands of workers being laid off."
The company says without the money it would have had to close within two days.

State Government to support Hartz

Premier Paul Lennon, today announced his Government will do whatever is reasonably possible to support Hartz and protect the jobs of workers.
“I contacted the Secretary of the Department of Economic Development and Tourism, Norm McIlfatrick at 7am this morning.
“I have also spoken to the Minister for Economic Development and Tourism, Paula Wriedt.
“Through the Department we will do whatever is possible to support Hartz during this difficult time,” Mr Lennon said.
The Secretary of the Department of Economic Development and Tourism has arranged an urgent meeting with company representatives tomorrow.
“Hartz is a very important business for Tasmania.
“We will, as a matter of urgency, look at what options are available to formally help this business,” Mr Lennon said.
“I want to see the jobs of workers protected, the direct jobs at Hartz and indirect jobs in the wider community, which could also disappear if the business went under.”
The State Government has provided previous support to Hartz.
This has included :
- $400,000 to assist Hartz re-locate the Mountain Maid factory to Tasmania in 2003, and
- $40,000 as part of the Export Market Assistance Program (05-07)

NZ signs FTA with China

Report: Catherine Clifford
Fifteen years in the making and lot of negotiations later, New Zealand has scored a coup by being the first developed country in the world to strike a Free Trade Agreement (FTA) with China.Under the FTA, New Zealand will have 97 per cent of tariffs on its exports to China removed by 2019.With farm output making up half of New Zealand's annual economic production, the deal is expected to double the nation's exports of meat and skins to China in the next year.It will add $11-million to current apple export volumes, and give New Zealand special status with its wool quota.President of the Federated Farmers of New Zealand, Charlie Pedersen, says he's elated."This has really been a long-haul project for our people at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade in the New Zealand government," he says.Charlie Pedersen says all areas of New Zealand agriculture will benefit from the deal because the Chinese is a massive market for any country that produces and exports food and commodities."There'll be about NZ$160-million in wool exports that will benefit," he says.Prior to the FTA being signed, New Zealand had to join other wool exporters in bidding for a share of the world's 287,000-tonne international quota set by China. Now, China is promising to take from New Zealand an initial 27,000 tonnes and increase that figure to 37,000 tonnes over the next nine years.Charlie Pedersen adds that the country's dairy industry will be a big winner, too."Dairy is the biggest exporter to China out of New Zealand by volume and by value, so about NZ$350-million of dairy exports a year," he says.Executive Director of the Dairy Companies Association of New Zealand (DCANZ), Jason Minkhorst, has applauded the deal.He says New Zealand's 11,000 dairy farmers will benefit from improved access to a rapidly growing consumer and ingredients market."Most of New Zealand's dairy products are exported, about 95 per cent, so China will become increasingly important to us," he says.But across the Tasman, president of Dairy Farmers Australia and the chairman of the Australian Dairy Industry Council, Allan Burgess, admits he's worried.Mr Burgess is calling on the Federal Government to fast-track its FTA negotiations with China to ensure Australian farmers are not left behind."It certainly puts Australia at some disadvantage in that New Zealand has some preferential agreement with China now," he says."We would hope it's the starting point from which the Australian FTA with China is built and we would hope that happens really soon," says Mr Burgess.

Wednesday, April 02, 2008

U.N. body meets to act on ship gases, cleaner seas

31 March 2008

Curbing greenhouse gas emissions from ships, slashing other air pollutants they generate and cleaning up the world's oceans, top the agenda at a meeting of the world's chief maritime body in London this week.
The U.N. International Maritime Organization (IMO) meeting, seen as one of the most crucial in years, focuses on how best to reduce harmful ship fuel pollutants like sulphur dioxide emissions and nitrous oxides.
"Shipping should not be allowed to become a scapegoat for those who find it a 'soft target' singling it out from other modes of transport, when data show it as having greener credentials than them," said IMO Secretary-General Efthimous Mitropoulos, opening the meeting on Monday.

EU Ambassador Questions U.S. Container Scanning Law

In conjunction with his visit to Baltimore today, European Union Ambassador to the United States, John Bruton, voiced concern over a U.S. law requiring all containers destined for the United States to be scanned:

Recent U.S. legislation stipulates that by 2012 every container on a ship destined for a U.S. port from Europe or other foreign country must be scanned by imaging equipment. However, the law does not require containers on ships leaving the United States going to Europe to be scanned in the same way.

China launches world's first e-tagged international container route

A Chinese vessel with e-tagged containers has set sail from Shanghai bound for Savannah port in the US, marking the opening of the world's first international e-tagged container route.
The doorbell-sized e-tags installed on 20-ft. container equivalent units (TEU), will record information about every procedure in the TEU's whole transportation process, such as the delivery and off-loading time, the real-time TEU condition and the time and place of the legal or illegal opening.

Australia Blocks Deal by Chinese Firm

By ALEX WILSONApril 2, 2008;
MELBOURNE, Australia -- In a setback for China's efforts to build ties with resource companies that can feed its economic growth, Australian regulators Tuesday blocked a Chinese steelmaker's attempts to buy nearly 20% of Mount Gibson Iron Ltd.
The Takeovers Panel ordered the purchase of shares in the iron-ore miner by Shougang Concord International Enterprise Co. to be canceled because the acquisition violates Australian law.
• The News: Australian regulators blocked a Chinese steelmaker's attempts to buy nearly 20% of Mount Gibson Iron.
• The Big Picture: It was a setback for China's efforts to build ties with resource companies that can feed its economic growth.
• The Background: Chinese steelmakers are looking for alternative suppliers to heavyweights Rio Tinto and BHP Billiton.
Chinese steelmakers are hoping to win access to new sources of iron ore as prices for the steelmaking component appear set to continue to rise. The companies are increasingly looking to alternative mining companies in Australia to ease their reliance on heavyweights Rio Tinto PLC and BHP Billiton Ltd.
China's Sinosteel Corp. has a hostile 1.2 billion Australian dollar (US$1.1 billion) bid on the table for iron-ore miner Midwest Corp., although that deal may fail in light of Australian investor opposition.
There is further pressure on Chinese steelmakers as annual iron-ore price talks have been extended beyond Monday's deadline while Rio Tinto and BHP push for a freight premium for their ore.
Shougang -- a unit of Chinese steelmaker Shougang Group -- struck a deal in January to buy a 19.73% stake in Mount Gibson from Russia's Gazmetal Holdings.
Mount Gibson then made an application to the Takeovers Panel on the basis that the purchase would breach Australian law because Shougang owns 18% of APAC Resources Ltd., which already has a 20.2% stake in Mount Gibson.

Good farming equals green beer

By Cameron Wilson
Friday, 28/03/2008
It's been proved that Tasmanian barley and hop growers are not only efficient, but only small carbon emitters in the overall production of beer.In response to the growing demand for environmental friendly products, Cascade recently released a 100 per cent carbon offset beer. In order to be certified the company spent 12 months auditing the total emissions in beer production, and then offsetting those emissions by investing in environmental projects around Hobart.Fosters sustainability manager Scott Delzoppo says the comprehensive assessment proves there's not much more expected of hop and barley growers. "The energy intensity in the primary production is a figure that's not that high. In fact I can tell you that, for example, the hops production is less than one percent of the overall emissions impact from the production of Cascade Green."

Work will start on a $20m upgrade of the Launceston Airport by the end of the month.

Tenders for the work closed today, and airport management expects to make a decision within a few weeks.
The airport's Manager, Pamela Graham, says the upgrade includes an X-ray baggage system, more retail space and a new-look terminal.
"Finally, probably a really important point to make, we're turning the terminal into a common user one, so that we'll have depatures at one end of the terminal and arrivals at the other," said Ms Graham.