Intercultural Business News

Greece has been cut off from the outside world for 24 hours as angry public sector workers brought the country’s airports, ferry terminals and overland border crossings to a standstill.

Revolutionary songs blared through loudspeakers in central Athens and tens of thousands of strikers chanted “Traitors! Traitors!” in front of the Greek parliament as they protested against government austerity measures designed to cut the country’s budget deficit of 12.7 per cent to 2.7 per cent in three short years.

The moves, which will entail a hiring freeze in the public sector, a 10 per cent cut in supplementary pay and an increase in the retirement age are supposed to send a signal to the rest of the eurozone that Greece is intent on getting its house in order.

Will The Strike Action Change The Government Decisions?

But the leftist unions are determined to make a stand against the Socialist government of George Papandreou.
 
“I always considered myself a socialist, ” said Petros Georgakis, an IT expert for a government ministry who was chanting anti-government slogans close to Athens university, “now I feel disgust. The minimum wage is being eroded and we will be driven into poverty as a society to please the plutocrats and the people in Brussels.”

The public sector workers union ADEDY holds sway over some half a million workers and it is determined on Wednesday to show its power.

Read More>Times Online

Today a team of local workmen in Panama will start to dig a hole partfunded by Japan, aided by Latin American cash and big enough to hold the world’s biggest Danish-owned, South Korean-built megaships. The ultimate winner, though, will be China.

The work, which coincides with the start of Panama’s dry season, is the latest phase in a $5.25 billion (£3.3 billion) project to widen the country’s famous canal — an expansion plan that could comprehensively reshape the flow of world trade and could even scupper Warren Buffett’s $34 billion “all-in” bet on American railways.

Work on deepening the Panama Canal begins amid more evidence of China’s roaring recovery from the global slump. Over the weekend, the closely watched Centre for Forecasting Science at the Chinese Academy of Sciences predicted that the country would return to double-digit rates of GDP growth this year. More critically for world trade, imports and exports are expected to grow by 19 per cent and 17 per cent, respectively.

Will Widening The Panama Canal Lower Import/Export Costs Worldwide?

These are precisely the sort of figures that have given new momentum to the Panama project — mooted a decade ago when Panama took possession of the canal from the United States. The aim is to increase vastly the canal’s capacity, in terms of both size and number of vessels. By doing so, shipping industry veterans say, it will re-establish the global importance of the isthmus.
The idea for an expansion began before China’s economic growth had truly begun to boom. The plans were drawn up in expectation of steady growth in Japanese exports to the United States and a rising tide of raw materials heading across the Pacific from Brazil.

Read More>Times Online

Britain and India today agreed the text of a deal that will allow British companies to enter the fray against Russia and France in the scramble to supply nuclear power equipment worth an estimated $150 billion.

The breakthrough, which emerged from talks held in London, comes after international sanctions that had prevented India from buying civilian nuclear technology for 30 years were lifted in 2008.

Lord Mandelson, the Business Secretary, said: “This is a very, very significant advance, and I look forward to that text being signed off at a ministerial level before long.”

The countries declined to give further details, but officials said it would provide “major trade opportunities” for British businesses.

UK Will Now Be Able To Bid On New Power Plant Production In India

 
India is expected to increase the power it generates from nuclear sources 100-fold in the next 40 years and American Government offials estimate that deals worth at least $150 billion will be generated.

A British Government spokesman added: “Fifty years after building the world’s first commercially operated power station, the UK is still one of the market leaders in this sector. It’s an industry that earns the UK £700 million in overseas business every year and employs over 80,000 people across the nuclear supply chain.”

Read More>Times Online

German megacorporation Siemens is setting itself up to get a slice of the Indian market. The company plans to double its capital expenditure to €250 million and wants to create 8000 new jobs in the country.

Siemens’ CEO Peter Löscher said he wants to grow the market share for infrastructure technologies, such as water plants and power, from the current five percent to 10 percent by 2012.

The workforce will expand from 17.000 to 25.000, reports the Financial Times Deutschland. Löscher was quoted as saying the growth rates of India and other developing countries were remarkable, which is why Siemens needed to expand its presence.

Will Siemens Indian Arm Expand?

He added that every third Indian has no power connection, which is why the Indian government wants to add 150 gigawatts of power in the next seven years – the equivalent of the total power capacity in Germany.

Twenty percent of it is supposed to come from renewable energy sources – which is why Siemens will invest €70 million in the construction of a factory for wind turbines in India. Löscher, who is currently in New Delhi, said the first turbines are to be shipped in 2012.

Read More>Tech Eye

The French government today announced that it was scrapping a controversial method for safety testing oysters on mice which has long been condemned as old-fashioned and unscientific.

For years, freshly-harvested oysters have been checked for harmful toxins by means of the “mouse bioassay”, in which rodents are injected with digestive fluids from oysters.

The test, in which three mice are injected with concentrated oyster fluids, decrees that, if two of the mice have died within 24 hours, a temporary ban on local sales must be implemented.

Change In Testing Laws To Guarantee Survival Of Oyster Farms, & Mice

For five successive years, negative mice test results have resulted in sales bans in key oyster-producing locations, shutting down business during periods of high demand and forcing many farmers into bankruptcy.

But in a move that prompted widespread relief among farmers in Europe’s biggest oyster-producing country, the Ministry of Agriculture said safety would from now on be established through more advanced chemical tests.

“It is huge news. I am delighted because the political promises have finally been kept,” Olivier Laban, the president of the Arcachon oyster farmers’ association, said

Read More>The Guardian